


The Landscape of Zuko, With Which He Has Become Familiar

by Drakey



Series: Landscapes [1]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Aangxiety, Angst, Anxiety, Appa Can Fly?, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, F/M, Gen, Good Dad Hakoda, Internalized Racist Language, Iroh (Avatar) is a Good Uncle, M/M, Momo With A Knife, Multi, Neurodivergent Aang, Neurodivergent Sokka, Neurodivergent Zuko, Ozai (Avatar) Being a Terrible Parent, Self-Harm, Slow Burn, Soulmate-Identifying Marks, Soulmates
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-09
Updated: 2020-08-16
Packaged: 2021-03-05 22:08:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 16
Words: 55,606
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25802620
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Drakey/pseuds/Drakey
Summary: Sokka blinks rapid-fire for a few moments, opens his mouth to respond, snaps it closed, and shakes his head, lips pursed. Zuko grabs his wrist. “What do you know?” he growls. His hand is burning hot, which always gets people to talk.And then a searing pain erupts on his own left wrist, and he jerks his hand back while Uncle exclaims “Prince Zuko!”Sokka cradles his own wound, staring in shock at Zuko, and shame bubbles up out of nowhereexcept where it always comes fromand has him turning away. He storms into the ship, down the corridors, and tries to ignore the way his heart still sings, even if the notes are a little sour just now.Zuko slams open the door of his cabin and tears off his shirt to stare at the fresh burn on his wrist. His own handprint. It isn't too bad, as burns go. Every trainee firebender gets a few this bad, but not usually in the shape of a handprint, and not this large.And he's done this to his own soulmate.
Relationships: Aang/Katara (Avatar), Bato/Hakoda (Avatar), Jet/Zuko (Avatar), Sokka/Suki (Avatar), Sokka/Yue (Avatar), Sokka/Zuko (Avatar)
Series: Landscapes [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1871992
Comments: 342
Kudos: 651





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Trigger warning for self harm in chapter 1, briefly referenced again throughout. To avoid it, skip from "Sokka yelps as" to "The really frightening moment" two scenes later.
> 
> Okay, here we go.
> 
> So, this is a complete season 1 rewrite where things start out about the same, but some people have soulmates and that changes everything.
> 
> In this world, not everyone has a soulmate. Soulmates are always destined to do great things together, and you can tell who they are because any injury that leaves a scar appears on both of them: not the scar, the injury itself. Yes, this can be fatal. Soulmates always die at the same time. Right now I'm done with part 1, and I'm starting up part 2 tomorrow or the next day. We're looking at about 55k, so strap in,

The first thing Sokka remembers clearly is his sister's head. All of his earlier memories are vague, or fuzzy, or just feelings or sounds. His sister's head, though, is easy. It is an average sized head, for a three year old child, and it is always under a hood when she is outside because her hair does not grow.

Katara is not bald. She has hair. It has just never grown enough to tell that it's there without touching her head. This, Sokka remembers doing, and noticing that his sister is the coldest thing in their little hut. He remembers asking his mother about it (because she is there at the time, and so the memory hurts just a little bit), and his mother not knowing why his sister is so cold all the time. 

They both suspect it has something to do with the tattoo.

It always takes Sokka a moment to remember the tattoo. It is blue, and most visible where it arcs over the top of her head. He does not remember noticing that it is also on her back and on her feet and on her hands and arms for a long time, but he was first aware of it on her head. The tattoo is a solid line except where it is tipped with an arrow, pointing down at the end of her nose.

It does not occur to Sokka until he is nine years old to ask about his sister's tattoo. For nearly two months, he has wept for his lost mother. The world is suddenly much larger than he expected. Sokka has, until now, lived in a world where sometimes it is dark all day for weeks, and sometimes the sun never sets, and men go out and fight all day so that they'll be better at fighting, and sometimes he wakes up with burns so he thinks that maybe the embers like to wander around at night, and his sister has hair that doesn't grow and a blue arrow tattoo and she's always extra cold. Now, though, he still lives in that world, but for a while there were twice as many people in it, and fire was everywhere, and people _died,_ and one of them was

Anyway, now he has to deal with the possibility of all that happening again, and maybe someone ~~else~~ important dying.

And the best way he has to counter that is to learn _absolutely everything there is to know_ because then he will know when things like this are going to happen and he won't ever be surprised like this again.

So he marches into the meeting hall in the dead of winternight while the elders are conferring about whether it's worth it to risk a fishing expedition. Gran Gran is there, and he has always been allowed to climb in her lap and sit, but it has been a year since he has done it. There is a tense silence, and no one objects. He will start with the knowledge that seems most pressing, that seems closest to him. When the conversation has wound down, Sokka speaks into the council chamber:

“Why is my sister so different?”

+

Katara screams when Sokka collapses. One moment, they are talking about about penguin sledding, and the next he is screaming, clutching at the left side of his face while the right side plummets directly into the fire. His screaming continues even after he is pulled out, horrific burns covering both sides of his face, barely missing his right eye, and nearly obliterating his left.

She bends, desperately, wrapping water around her hands with shaky excess and covering her brother's burns. She wills the water to be cool and nurturing, to soothe the burn, holds its temperature in a technique she barely knows well enough to melt snow, and maybe it's a natural talent or maybe it's because she's panicking, or maybe the spirits just choose to act through her, but the water begins to glow. It doesn't last long. Sokka's flesh slowly knits together, the burns heal just a little, and Katara just can't get the knack of the healing again. A master waterbender could probably tell her what she's missing, but it refuses to come until the following summer.

In the meantime, Sokka almost dies. 

+

Aang wakes up in a coffin. His heart beats frantically. He is trapped. He cannot move he cannot breatheheistrappedheistrappeditistoocoldheisgoingtoDIE

Aang falls asleep

+

Zuko wakes up on a navy ship. Something is covering his left eye. Uncle is next to him, a tight expression far removed from a smile on his face.

Zuko reaches up to feel his face. There is a bandage over most of the left side of it. 

“You are lucky, Prince Zuko,” Uncle says. Zuko squeezes his right eye shut.

He wants to ask why Uncle would say such a thing, but he knows already. He has always turned up with mysterious wounds and pains. His mother worried he was hurting himself on purpose, his father has always just assumed he is clumsy and stupid. Uncle has never doubted Zuko's claims that they just appear there on their own. He has a scar on his left thumb from a wound that appeared when he was eight and which Uncle insists must have been from a fish hook; Zuko has never been fishing. There is a burn scar on his left forearm that is definitely from a hot pan: it had felt much worse than a simple bending burn. 

There is a large, patchy burn on the right side of his face that stings and smolders and feels like it is still on fire. His father only burned his left side. The right came a few seconds later, like an aftershock.

This does not happen to his sister. His father and his uncle and his mother and all his most distant relatives, and his entire fucking family are not subjected to this.

Most of them disbelieve him because the alternative is to envy him. Not everyone has a soulmate. 

“There will be no missing your soulmate now,” Uncle goes on. “You will step into their town, and everyone will know right away. They will usher you two together.”

“Uncle, why am I on a ship?” Zuko opens his eye again. He can hear the engine, smell the metal-and-sea tang, feel the sway of the waves. 

“Prince Zuko, I must ask you to swear something to me,” Uncle says instead of answering. Fire Nation banners catch the sound of his voice, make it private in this steel box.

“What?” Zuko asks.

“There are two forces that shape your destiny, Nephew. There is your honor as a man, and there is your heart's twin. Please, Prince Zuko, swear to me that you will cherish both with the same passion. Honor will do you no good without happiness.”

Zuko stares hard at Uncle. This request is so strange. “Why wouldn't I love my soulmate?”

“Because we are leaving the Fire Nation, and you will probably find your soulmate on... other shores. You will probably find your soulmate among those who think you are an enemy.”

Zuko has been frowning from the beginning, but he feels his face fall even further. They are leaving the Fire Nation.

+

Sokka yelps as a line of fire draws itself down his left arm. He claps his hand to the spot and finds that blood is already beginning to soak into his parka sleeve. “Shit,” he whispers. He winces at the way his skin stretches and pulls across his face. “Katara!” 

She pokes her head out from where she has been detangling a net a little way off. “Sokka?”

Sokka points at his reddening coat. “The angsty little weirdo is doing it again!” 

Katara sighs. “Give me your arm,” she grumbles. 

This is the seventh time Sokka's soulmate has taken a blade to their own flesh. At first, Sokka assumed they were being tortured. After all, a massive facial burn suggests the Fire Nation had done something... _untoward_ to his soulmate. By now, though, Sokka has accepted that this is deliberate and probably self inflicted. He shucks his parka right there by the canoes and pulls his tunic sleeve back to reveal the bright blood and _ow, you motherfucker, stop cutting us_ the beginnings of a second cut. Katara coats her hands in water and begins to heal him. The cuts close as fast as they open.

+

Zuko tosses the dagger aside and stares at the wounds closing up. He hasn't gotten further than the third stroke since the third time he tried, and now he must wrestle with the temptation to try for a bigger injury. Any more and he will risk death. Zuko does not want to die, but he does very much want to hurt.  
Tears sting his ruined left eye.

+

The really frightening moment, Katara thinks, is the moment she realizes it is a spear wound. The wound isn't deep enough or in the right place to kill. Sure, Sokka will eventually bleed to death if left untreated, but even if Katara couldn't bend at all, this injury would be easy to treat. 

It's not that this one almost kills Sokka. Nothing will ever be more terrifying than The Burn, she thinks. Less than half an hour after Sokka grips his side and doubles over while they are out fishing, he is telling jokes, though obviously a little shaken.

The thing is, Katara knows wounds. By now she is intimately familiar with them. She is a gifted healer in a village that leads a dangerous, often violent life. A knife cuts thus, a club crushes so, this is from a boning knife and this from a hunting knife and this from a dueling knife, and this from a fishing spear mishandled and that from a fishing spear mis-aimed. The wound that Katara has just closed has left a patch of fragile new skin, scar-in-waiting, on Sokka's chest, across his left nipple, coming to a puckered once-hole in the meaty side of his upper chest, just below his armpit. This is not a wound acquired in an accident. It is a wound acquired in a fight, in deadly earnest, a blow at the heart deflected at the last moment. 

And it is a wound made by a Water Tribe war spear. She would stake her bending on it.

Somewhere, Sokka's soulmate has just fought a Water Tribe warrior in a duel to the death. Sokka is alive, so she can only assume the warrior is not.

Katara doesn't mention her theory. Somewhere, her soulmate is frozen and impossible.


	2. Chapter 2

The iceberg has a person in it, a boy sitting in a perfect lotus pose. He is hairless, turned blue by the thickness of ice between them, and there is an arrow, almost seeming to glow on his forehead. Katara immediately begins to cry, because it makes sense. She grabs Sokka's club and sprints towards the ice as her brother exclaims in surprise. 

The arrow brightens. The boy's eyes open, a pair of white-glowing spots. 

“He's alive in there!” Katara yells. “We have to help him!” She swings the club, and it connects with the ice once, then something inside her shudders and suddenly the ice is melting, streams of killing-cold water rushing by them on either side as a column of blue light roars into the sky.

For the first time in her life, Katara feels something besides icy cold. At first, she has no idea that what she is feeling is _warmth,_ but by the time the boy has dropped to the ice, she is ready to accept it. She stares at him, but she has known since she glimpsed even a hint of the human form. A boy, trapped in ice. Her soulmate, so cold it touches her.

But the bonding of soulmates is not complete until they recognize each other, and so she rushes forward across the ice as he climbs out and slowly collapses. The same something as before shudders inside of her as his tattoos fade to the same blue as her own. 

“Fuck,” Sokka whispers feelingly behind her. “Katara, he's your soulmate. He has to be.”

She feels him and _how is it that she has gone her whole life without feeling warm_ he starts to stir. His eyes, huge and stormy grey, take her in, and he says “I guess you guys found me after all, huh?” He sits up, looking around. “How did I get down by the ice? Where's Monk Gyatso? Is he with Appa?” He spots Sokka and blinks. “What's with the Water Tribe guy?”

Katara stares through the barrage of questions. Finally, noticing her silence, the boy turns back to her. “Why don't I know you?” he asks. “I know everyone in the Southern Temple.”

Sokka steps forward. “Um,” he says. He looks at Katara. _Spirits of ice and snow, warm feels so incredible!_ Sokka takes the boy off to speak in hushed tones with him, casting concerned looks at Katara. 

She has met her soulmate, but the boy is incomprehensible and doesn't seem to know that her tattooed head is a soulscar. Warmth is incredible; not the heat of a fire but the gentle absence of cold's piercing claws. Warmth can't entirely disguise the horrible emptiness of meeting the person who could explain it all and not understanding him.

But then, suddenly, the boy from the iceberg is running pell-mell across the ice, and he has to catch her hands to keep from falling over. 

“I'm Aang!” he says, too loudly.

“Left leg,” Sokka suggests, and Katara points to Aang's left leg. He lifts it in response and stares at a scabbed-over wound. There are so many of them, scattered across his body, some closer to healed than others. Katara points out the ones she can remember, starting with the long knife cut from five years ago. She names them as she heals them with seawater, and if the warmth of earlier was bliss, the feeling that dawns in her now is a kind of ecstasy, as comprehension and certainty flood through Aang. 

The sealing of their bond occurs when they meet each other's eyes again. It is the purest joy Katara will ever experience in her life, deep and buoying as the ocean, uncomplicated by traces of other emotion, unnatural, and clean.

“Katara,” she breathes. 

+

Katara, Aang thinks, may be the perfect soulmate. This is, he knows, based only on the fact that she is extremely pretty. Also, his soulmate is, by definition, the perfect soulmate. That's how soulmates work. She is also (thank you, Sokka, for explaining), a member of the Southern Water Tribe, even though Monk Gyatso insists that the Avatar's soulmate is always from the same nation as the Avatar. They are born together, they meet, they live together, they die together. 

He remembers the lessons like they were yesterday (although he is beginning to suspect that he has been gone far longer than he wanted to be, and it may have been several months now. He wonders if his birthday has come and gone). 

_The Avatar's soulmate is always from the same nation as the Avatar._ Well, no. Katara is Water Tribe.

_The Avatar's soulmate is always a bender._ She did that even before they were on the way to their village (Aang thought the Southern Water Tribe lived in a bigger city. This must be a small outpost).

_The Avatar's soulmate, like anyone else's soulmate, will have all of the same scars as the Avatar._ Well. That is a bit... hard. Because Aang has all of the same scars as Katara, plus nineteen more. Of the thirty four marks on his body, he shares fifteen with Katara. The other nineteen are all cuts and other wounds that Katara healed for him on the iceberg. Eleven of those are burns. Sokka, Katara's brother, watches the counting of the scars in the village meeting hall. He watches through a face covered in burns that must have almost killed him when they happened. Three of the women who attend the counting have visible burns: one on the bottom of her jaw, one on her hand, and one creeping up the back of her neck. 

Kanna, Katara's grandmother, steps forward from conferring with the other women. Aang shakes with a nervousness he has not felt since they told him he is the Avatar.

“We cannot explain the extra scars,” Kanna says, “but you have felt the Sealing, and you share enough scars, and the tattoos. There can be no doubt.” She looks grim. “But I must ask you where the Air Nomads have gone to survive.”

“Survive?” Aang repeats, and the doubts that have swirled around burns and missing time begin to crystallize. He feels his jaw clench. He tells himself it means nothing. Things seem ominous because he is lost and disoriented, and any minute now, someone will send a messenger to Monk Gyatso, and he's going to get a major scolding, but that's okay, because he's twelve, he's supposed to make trouble. “I just came from the Southern Temple, that's all.

Kanna grimaces. 

_She knows something._

“What happened?” Aang asks.

Kanna opens up her mouth, and she ~~destroys the whole world.~~

+

“There is no point in antagonizing the locals,” Iroh argues when they spot the tiny Water Tribe village. Since that light appeared in the sky, Zuko has been determinedly following it. 

Iroh admits, in the middle of his third unhelpful cup of jasmine tea, that the Avatar can make a light like that. This is in the early afternoon, when they find an iceberg that has been torn apart and partially melted by some unnatural force.

By now, Iroh has switched to a minty green, and he sets down his cup as Zuko turns towards the helmsman. “Prince Zuko, remember your promise,” Iroh prompts. Zuko winces.

“They have the Avatar, Uncle!” Zuko cries his long ponytail whipping around his head. 

“If they do, then they have had him for hours. And Prince Zuko, we have been in the area for hours. Moving slowly. They know we are coming. Please, be cautious. And remember your promise.” Iroh begins to gather his things: game tiles, tea kettle, cup, tea. 

Zuko has forgotten his promise to arrive in new places respectfully only twice before. The first time, they were chased away by Earth Kingdom ships, back before Admiral Dee crushed the last of the northern fleet. The second time, Zuko had been sure the Avatar was being hidden at an old temple.

Privately, Iroh is sure that his nephew has succeeded. The odds are so wildly against it, but the certainty is there.

+

Sokka does not tremble. Or rather, he saves his trembling for other moments. Every time, in the last few years, that a traveler has arrived, he has shaken with nervousness until he sees a face unmarred by burns. Katara and Aang are with the children, moving into the nearest hills to hide, Katara doing everything she can to bend their tracks away. The women have all gathered knives, and they wait inside the ~~pathetic~~ thick walls of snow and ice that protect their village from the elements.

Across the shelf of ice between Sokka and the sea, the Fire Navy ship comes to a stop. A ramp lowers from it. Armored, uniformed men march across the ice and snow. Their leader is youngish, by his build, with a slightly different helmet. Sokka thinks the youth must have a visor instead of that hideous skull-shaped faceplate: his eyes seem to be covered. Sokka may be wrong. His left eye has never returned to normal, and he struggles with it at times.

Hidden by his war paint, Sokka clutches his boomerang. The soldiers stop about fifty yards away. The youth calls out “Water Tribe! I would speak with your leader!”

“You can talk to me,” Sokka calls out. “Come closer. Alone. There are thirty blades waiting for you if you move wrong.” This is technically true. Half of them are paring knives, and none are wielded by people who are well trained. The Fire Nation doesn't need to know that.

The youth comes closer. Sokka peers at him. 

His helmet has no faceplate, no visor. It does not shadow his eyes. His eyes are just... different. Around the right eye, in patches like a map of the world, there are burns and welts that nevertheless fail to touch the eye itself. There, on the bridge of his nose, is the burn that Sokka thinks almost destroyed his left eye for good. And there, of course, over his left eye and much of the left side of his face...

Sokka stares.

The youth stops. “I'm looking for the Avatar,” he says. _You and the rest of the world, buddy._ “He's here. Hand him over.”

Sokka is silent. The youth narrows his one good eye. 

“Hello?”

“How are you Fire Nation?” Sokka finally asks.

The youth blinks. “What?”

“Are you trying to tell me you can't see my... oh. War paint. You can't see my face.” Sokka blushes fiercely and tries to ignore the mortification. He drops his boomerang, grabs snow from underfoot, and scrubs away the paint over his left eye.

“What are you doing?” the youth growls angrily. “I told you, I'm here to find—“

Sokka finishes scrubbing the paint away as the youth speaks, and cuts him off by stepping forward and sliding down the front of the wall. All the soldiers tense up, the youth freezes, and Sokka comes to rest barely three feet from him. 

“You're here to find me,” Sokka says, “but you're not supposed to be Fire Nation. How does a Fire Nation citizen almost die by burns?”

They lock eyes, and comprehension floats up on the boy's face. “No,” he whispers. “Not now.” But then the Sealing hits them, the awful certainty of _joy_ that they've found each other exactly where Sokka least wanted to find his soulmate.

But, “soulmates are special,” Gran Gran always says. “Most people don't get one, and it looks like yours will need you more than most.” But how can he give anything to a Fire Nation soldier. So as the most perfect thing he will ever feel in his life wells up in Sokka's chest, he fights it. But there is no fighting this. There is no escape from the flawless joy that burns in him like a bonfire in the depth of winternight. He is not in love. That comes later, if at all. But he has no choice. He cannot leave this be. The joy and rightness is as incontrovertible as a knife to the gut. 

“Zuko,” the boy says.

“Sokka,” Sokka answers. He looks back at the village. “If I go with you, will you leave my people alone?”

Zuko sighs. “I...” He looks back at his men. Back to Sokka. His men, Sokka, the wall, the ship. There is someone still on the deck of the ship. “Gather your things, say goodbye to your people. We can't stay here. They won't let us stay here.”

Sokka feels a headache bloom all at once in the back of his skull, expanding in heartbeats towards his forehead. “Come in with me. I have to explain to them.” He turns and doesn't look back. He doesn't need to. Zuko's feet crunch loudly as he trudges through the snow. A full village of warriors would have slaughtered this shipload. No resistance will stop them now. Sokka extends a hand behind him. “Helmet,” he prompts, and because you don't meet your soulmate without _trusting_ the person who has held your life in their hands from day one, Zuko's helmet is dropped into Sokka's hand. Sokka steps past the wall, and the women stare at him, holding a Fire Nation helmet in one hand, and then Zuko steps in, and everyone freezes. Sokka holds in a slightly-hysterical quip about how a Fire Nation soldier should maybe thaw them. 

“Gran Gran,” Sokka says. Behind him, Zuko snickers. “This is Zuko. He's agreed to leave the village alone if I go with him. I don't think we have the time to count up the scars, but...” he gestures to his face. “I'm here to get my things.” He heads towards his home. Gran Gran follows.

“Are you sure about this, Sokka?” she asks.

Sokka ducks inside. His possessions are meager. Most of them are weapons. There are a few precious scrolls, and one tiny bound book. He gathers it all before he answers. Zuko is standing beside Gran Gran, both of them framed by the doorway.

“What else would you do? You and the rest of the village women kill him, and then I'll be dead and they'll just burn it all to the ground.” He gestures around as he steps back outside with his things. “He's my _soulmate,_ Gran Gran. He came here looking for the Avatar, but obviously we don't have the Avatar. We have me, though. He can't kill me any more than you can kill him. Stalemate. It's better if he takes me and we leave.”

Gran Gran hurries up to Sokka, and she presses him into a hug. Her face buries itself in his hair. “Be safe, Sokka,” she whispers.

“Tell Katara what happened,” Sokka says back.

He lets Zuko lead the way out of the village. When they return to Zuko's soldiers, there are gasps and whispers. No one questions the decision to leave. Apparently, even the Fire Nation still knows that this one last thing is sacred. The soldiers follow placidly behind Sokka and Zuko. They climb up the ramp, onto the ship. The ramp comes up behind them. Up, through the bowels of the ship. It is dark, and too hot, and it smells like grease and metal. As they emerge onto the deck, Sokka realizes he left his boomerang. He almost runs back to go and get it. But he can't do that. He thinks he understands. He is Zuko's soulmate because that will save the village.

“Prince Zuko,” A kindly old man's voice says, and Sokka tries not to flinch at the title. “I did not think the Avatar would give up without a... oh. Oh. _Oh!”_ A man, stocky and grey, steps forward to claim the voice, and his eyes go comically wide. “Prince Zuko!”

Sokka knows almost nothing about his soulmate. A tortured boy, certainly, if the way he used to hurt himself on purpose is any indication. A _fucking PRINCE,_ apparently. And since they have met, Sokka has already placed Zuko in the “so serious it hurts” category. When Zuko starts _giggling_ at the old man's expression, the sound is so unexpected that it startles Sokka and he can't help joining in.

“Your _face_ Uncle!” Zuko manages. “You should see your _face!”_

“Uncle” recovers fairly quickly, all things considered. He doesn't react with the wounded dignity Sokka expects. Instead, a fond and unguarded smile tops his generous beard. He waits out Zuko's giggling fit _what kind of genocidal prince has giggling fits?_ and moves to clasp Sokka's arm in a perfect Water Tribe handshake as the laughter fades.

“I am Iroh,” he says. “You have already met my nephew, Prince Zuko.”

“Um... Sokka,” Sokka says. He is a little surprised that he is not yet in chains. He looks around. Now that Zuko is recovered there is a look of unmistakable panic in his eyes. “What do we do now?” Sokka asks.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's more references to self-harm in this chapter, and a brief reference to vomiting in the final scene.

Sokka has done it. Katara doesn't know how, but the village is intact, and the Fire Nation ship is leaving. They are nearly out of sight by the time she and Aang make it back to the village with the children. Gran Gran is waiting out front, and she has a pair of bundles in her arms. Katara recognizes traveler's bundles, with the essentials for a week and the equipment to get the essentials for much longer.

“Gran Gran,” Katara calls, “Where's Sokka? Is he hurt?” Sokka is always hurt. Between his own clumsiness and whatever awful, stupid thing his soulmate has done recently, her brother rarely goes a day without bleeding. Now, she fears he is at death's door from chasing away a Fire Nation attack.

“He is fine,” Gran Gran says. “One of the soldiers, the one who was in charge, has a burn on his face. Just like Sokka.”

The walk to the village has been long and tiring, but that is probably not why a drop of sweat rolls, frigid, down Katara's spine. Cold feels so much worse than it did before Aang. Sokka's soulmate. The one who took a Water Tribe spear to the chest. The Fire Nation soldier. “Where is Sokka?” Katara asks.

“He went with them so they would leave us alone.” Gran Gran turns to Aang. “You haven't told us everything, have you? He was looking for the Avatar.”

Aang withers a little beside Katara. “I'm...” He looks down at the snow. “I'm the Avatar. I'm sorry. I'll go get—“

“You'll do no such thing,” Gran Gran interrupts. “He's as safe as he'll get on that ship. You need to go to someone who can help you. The Northern Water Tribe is in much better shape than we are.” She thrusts one of the bundles into Aang's arms and turns to Katara. “Look after your brother if you get the chance,” she says. There is the tiniest hint of tears in her eyes. “I love you, Katara.” She hands the second bundle to Katara. Katara takes it. Gran Gran turns back to Aang. “It has been a hundred years,” she says. “but maybe it had to be that way. Go. Do what you must do.”

Aang's eyes grow huge and suspiciously moist. “I'll bring back your grandson,” he blurts, looking surprised by the words coming out of his mouth. “I should have been there to save—“

Katara drops her bundle and hugs him. “It's not your fault,” she says, firm enough to seem almost aggressive. “This is _their_ fault. It's the Fire Nation's fault. Now let's go. You said Appa can fly?”

+

Appa can fly.

There is a sort of yawning void in Aang's soul, the place where thousands upon thousands of his people should be, but right now there is a crisis, and his emotions are definitely not helping, so he reminds himself of the time that Monk Gyatso made him practice all of his mastery katas while listening to sad music until he could work past the feeling. That was a fight against _In the Shadow of the Mountain,_ but this is a struggle to contend with...

With what Kanna told him.

The difference is like a summer sprinkle next to a hurricane.

A century feels horribly wrong, but also horribly _accurate._ Monk Gyatso probably isn't getting him out of this one. But Monk Gyatso always told him that this day would come, so Aang holds onto the reins and tries to think about who he is rescuing. Katara is his soulmate. Such a privilege, to have a soulmate. And he hasn't, until now, realized exactly how incredible it is. 

All told, he feels as though he is riding a storm wind. He has done it successfully on his glider, when one of the older boys had dared him, and Aang had always had a weakness for that boy's smile. It is, Monk Gyatso warned him that night after he came back, always a thrill until the last time, when it kills you.

The whole world buzzes around him. Appa's fur is rough and needs brushing, the wind passing through it less smoothly than it should. Below, he can feel the sway of the ocean, and the soft tug of the earth below that. Somewhere ahead burns the flame of the Fire Nation ship. He brings Appa up into the clouds, and Katara gasps, clutching the boomerang she took from the village wall.

Appa can fly.

Aang is surprised by how good it feels, in the middle of ~~what Kanna told him~~ everything, to show someone who has never met a sky bison just how well Appa can fly. He decides to focus on that, and while the world still buzzes in his head, at least it's almost pleasant now.

+

Zuko puts the Water Tribe boy in his cabin. It hurts, to sequester him away under guard. Sokka—the Water Tribe boy—will only distract him. 

That village almost certainly _was_ hiding the Avatar, but the element of surprise is gone, spoiled by...

By what, Zuko wonders as he watches the sea roll by below him. His heart has sung within him since he met this boy, but a singing heart can't capture the Avatar. And Zuko wants all this traveling to end in success. Uncle steps up beside him to look over the side as well. He waits, damnably patient. Finally, Zuko huffs a sigh, and in the petulant tone of the teenager he is, he says “what is it, Uncle?”

“I thought you would be spending some time with your soulmate, now that you have found him.” This is more direct than the start of an Uncle Talk usually is, but the last few hours have been more than strange enough that beating around the bush wouldn't make sense.

“He's Water Tribe! What am I supposed to say to him? I was expecting... I don't know, a girl from the colonies, not a boy. Not a boy who's angry he can't kill me.”

Uncle watches a turtlewhale for a few moments. “I have suspected your soulmate is a boy for a while. The scars you got from him seemed like boys' scars. There is nothing wrong with it. My grandfather might have looked down on them, but there have always been men who are inclined that way. I have known a few, and they are all men of character and intelligence.” He grins. “Even if some of them are a little eccentric.”

Zuko splutters. “I am not... not... I'm not like that. I don't... he's just a Water Tribe boy!”

“I'm not _just_ anything, Fire Boy,” Sokka says, stepping out of the superstructure as though he hasn't been specifically told to stay and also kept under guard. Without his weapons. His guard trails behind him, looking miserable.

“I'm sorry, Prince Zuko,” the guard says. “He threatened to leave a scar on both of you if we tried to stop him.”

Zuko stares. He can feel flames wreathing his fists, and he takes a few marching steps towards Sokka, who stands his ground, face set. “It's your fault I lost the Avatar!” Zuko yells, and he's not sure when or even if he decided that yelling was a good idea, but now that it's tearing out of his throat at top volume, he can't stop it. “He was there!”

“What the fuck are you talking about?” Sokka asks, as though this isn't the most important thing in the world. 

“The _light!”_ Zuko yells. “The fucking straight-up-in-the-air light that made a storm! It was right by your village!”

Sokka blinks rapid-fire for a few moments, opens his mouth to respond, snaps it closed, and shakes his head, lips pursed. Zuko grabs his wrist. “What do you know?” he growls. His hand is burning hot, which always gets people to talk. 

And then a searing pain erupts on his own left wrist, and he jerks his hand back while Uncle exclaims “Prince Zuko!”

Sokka cradles his own wound, staring in shock at Zuko, and shame bubbles up out of nowhere ~~except where it always comes from~~ and has him turning away. He storms into the ship, down the corridors, and tries to ignore the way his heart still sings, even if the notes are a little sour just now.

Zuko slams open the door of his cabin and tears off his shirt to stare at the fresh burn on his wrist. His own handprint. It isn't too bad, as burns go. Every trainee firebender gets a few this bad, but not usually in the shape of a handprint, and not this large.

And he's done this to his own soulmate.

But.

But his soulmate is Water Tribe. Savage, dangerous, and most importantly, _the enemy._

Sokka is... he is rude, and uncivilized, and that face paint was... actually not so bad, from a distance, but Zuko is sure he would have looked terrible up close, and he is... What else is he? A little shorter than Zuko. Dark skin, dark hair not as dark as Zuko's, lots of blue in his outfit, very blue eyes, blue war club. His hair is better than Zuko's. Zuko knows perfectly well he is not exactly pulling off the ponytail.

But Sokka is _not_ what Zuko wanted.

He crosses the room, towards his desk, and sighs. A new fact. Sokka is a snoop. Papers are strewn over the wooden top, but none of them are important. Zuko keeps the important things in the waterproof safe at the back of the bridge. Instead, Sokka has sorted through a few personal letters, some notes on ship upgrades his engineer wants to try, and...

There are thirty three of the sketches. The first, a clumsy drawing of a girl in traditional Ember Island clothes, holding a little flame and looking somehow forlorn with the huge burns across her face.

A colonies girl, firebending and frowning at her scars. An Earth Kingdom girl, bending in tandem with a sketchy, uncertain Zuko, mowing down Earth Kingdom troops with rocks and flames. A whole series of sketchy Airbender girls with lurid burn marks from his visits to the Air Temples. There had been no secret survivors to find a soulmate among.

From there, it moves on. More confident drawings: a Fire Nation socialite who has turned the scar into a handsome excuse for a veil, an Earth Kingdom peasant girl tending a little garden while a more confidently-sketched Zuko watches her, a competently-rendered tracker who turns the scar intimidating, further and further into peasant girls and quality drawings of something almost domestic. The last drawing of a fight is the thirteenth. The last drawing that does not show a home is the sixteenth.

“I'm not sorry,” Sokka says from the doorway. Zuko's anger flares hot within him. His wrist still stings, and he wants to scream and rage. “You just.. dumped me in here. I wasn't gonna _not look around._ That's what chumps do.”

“Chumps are polite?” Zuko can't help responding.

“Every chump I know.”

“How many chumps do you know?”

Sokka laughs a little. “Five, but that's, like, a quarter of the village.”

“Your village has a lot of chumps,” Zuko notes. “You're not going to find that many outside of it.”

“You're telling me the rest of the world is tragically underchumped?” Sokka complains, and Zuko can't help laughing. Okay, so maybe Sokka is also funny. “Look, I won't say I'm sorry for looking around. I'm stuck with you. I might as well learn about you.”

Zuko turns to look at him. He is leaning in the doorway, clutching his left wrist. His clothes are burned around it, singed and ragged. Zuko crosses the room and pulls Sokka's hand from his wrist. “You'll make it worse. Go sit down.” He points to the bed, and Sokka sits while Zuko finds the burn cream in his cupboard. When he approaches Sokka, he works up the courage to ask, “What did you learn?”

“You wanted a girl,” Sokka says. “Someone to fight with at first. But then you got tired of fighting. Probably around...” he pokes the spear wound on Zuko's chest, “then.”

“Shirt off,” Zuko prompts. While Sokka works on his clothes, Zuko says “You're not wrong. Uncle always talks about opening up a tea shop. Sometimes... that sounds kind of peaceful. Like nobody would stab me with a spear, then.”

Sokka pulls off the last of his layers. The spear wound is there on him, as well. And the row of cuts around his upper arms. Zuko looks away from those. His palms itch for the handle of a carving knife.

As Zuko leans down to work the salve into the burn, he says “When that happened, the wound partly closed on its own.”

“That was probably my sister,” Sokka says. “She also stopped it when you started slicing us up.”

Zuko tenses. He manages not to squeeze Sokka's already burned wrist, but it's a near thing. He wonders why he didn't just hand the cream to Sokka. He doesn't think he could have. Somehow, this feels right. A prince, kneeling on the floor in front of a foreign peasant.

“I fell in the house fire,” Sokka says quietly. “It hurt so bad that I just sorta...” he holds his right hand up and slowly tilts it to horizontal, blowing a raspberry. “Facedown in the fire.”

Zuko nods, and if he can't tell his soulmate, who can he tell? “It was my father.”

Sokka tenses up. Zuko takes his hands off the burn. He's all greasy from the ointment. “My father is Fire Lord Ozai. I spoke out of turn at a council meeting, so he... he punished me.”

Sokka's face, when Zuko looks up, has undergone a startling transformation. It is twisted into a scowling sneer. “He. Did. WHAT?”

+

Appa can fly. Katara is still trying to get over it when they spot the ship, still trying to process when they move up above the clouds to avoid the ship spotting them, still very excited about it when they drop into the sea at the end of the day to let Appa rest. They've pulled far ahead, but it's easy to see the smoke coming out of the ship, still approaching them.

Aang is practically vibrating beside her. He has been since they took off. By now, the initial surge of good feeling has worn off. Aang is no longer a perpetual happiness machine. He still feels incredibly _right_ beside her, but by now, Katara is aware that she barely knows her soulmate. She is also aware that her head itches abominably, and that Aang is probably not as overwhelmingly happy as he seems to be. She watches him carefully for a few moments.

“So... no idea how we can get Sokka back, still?”

Aang shakes his head. His smile, which has been trying in vain to reach his eyes for several hours, falls completely away. “If having your brother is the only thing that's stopping the firebender from attacking your village, then we can't take him away. And if he wants to capture me, then going in there to get him back...” Aang hugs himself tightly. 

“We could try to sink the ship,” Katara says.

“That would kill people,” Aang objects.

“We might not have a choice,” Katara points out.

“Kanna... your grandmother... she said we shouldn't try to get Sokka back. But we have to. We can't leave him with them.” Aang bends a gust of wind into the water that stirs it up to a boil.

Katara frowns. She wants, so badly, to climb aboard that ship and rescue Sokka. She wants every one of those Fire Nation monsters to pay for what they've done to her family. She wants that ship at the bottom of the sea. And she remembers...

“I knew,” Katara says. “I knew his soulmate was Fire Nation. A couple of years ago, we were out fishing, and this... wound... appeared on his chest. It was from a Water Tribe war spear. There's no way that happens by accident. Someone was trying to kill him, and I recognized that they'd done it with a Water Tribe weapon. I didn't say anything. He would have been so hurt. Aang, what if he's supposed to... to go with the firebender?”

Aang freezes. For a moment, just a moment, his eyes seem to flash with the same searing light that was in them when they first met. “Katara, no.”

“Then what do we do?” Katara asks.

+

Sokka doesn't leave Zuko's cabin until the aurora is lighting up the sky to the exclusion of everything else. Iroh is holding a little music night on the deck, and he moves aside for Sokka, patting the spot where he sat before. Sokka sits and accepts a cup of tea. It smells like cinnamon. Gran Gran has almost a full ounce of Omashu cinnamon, leftover from when her long ago journey across the world to the Southern Water Tribe. She puts a pinch of it into meals cooked for birthdays, and it is the only time Sokka tastes it, until now.

A sailor is doing a cheerfully randy version of what Sokka recognizes as a traditional Water Tribe sea ballad. Iroh leans over and speaks in a polite undertone to Sokka. “I see my nephew has been kind enough to replace the clothes he burned.”

Sokka nods. “I didn't know his life had been so... did his father really burn him?”

Iroh purses his lips. “It is forbidden to speak ill of the royal family.”

“If you're his uncle, doesn't that make you royalty, too?”

Iroh takes a very slow, measured sip of his tea. He does not move. Finally, he says “I was not made for the throne. I was next in line, when my father died, but my younger brother,” Iroh looks into his tea. The man is a mystery. He seems kind _he is Fire Nation,_ and somehow very sad _he is Fire Nation,_ and like he's trying to make the best _he is Fire Nation_ of a bad situation.

Iroh does not finish his statement. Sokka thinks he can probably guess what the current Fire Lord did. Somehow, it seems to fit.

The sailor's song ends after a moment, and Sokka pipes up. “You know that was a Water Tribe ballad, right?”

“Really?” the sailor says. “I learned it from a who... a nice girl in the Earth Kingdom.”

“Nice,” Sokka mutters. “You want to hear the original?” He looks to the man with the tsungi horn and the man with the pan flute. “Same music.”

There are some nods all around, and Sokka stands up. 

Three minutes later, he sits down. The men are all silent. It is not a good silence. It makes Sokka remember the last time he sang, when Katara told him off for making fun of the spirits he was trying to honor. Iroh smiles at him. “You have a... powerful voice. Have you ever considered training?”

Sokka blushes. He stares down at the deck, trying not to think about the fact that it is icy cold. “Sorry,” he says.

Iroh pats him on the shoulder. “It is okay, Sokka. How boring it would be to be a master of everything. For example, I have never cooked an egg correctly in my life, and I handle spicy food very poorly.” Iroh levers himself up. He sings _Four Seasons, Four Loves,_ competently, if not professionally, and he sits back down next to Sokka. “Perhaps your talent lies with an instrument.”

“The only thing I've ever been great at is using a boomerang,” Sokka says. “And I left that at home. My own _soulmate_ doesn't even want me.”

“You are counting your chicken-lizards before they hatch.” Iroh lays a comforting hand on Sokka's back. “My nephew is having trouble thinking of what do do next. Long ago, in the early days of our exile, he made a promise to me, that he would not put his happiness behind his honor when he found you. Whatever you are supposed to be for each other, you will be. And Zuko will do the right thing when he must choose. I believe in him.”

The dancing lights overhead paint Iroh's face with blues and greens that shimmer and coruscate across his eyes. The tsungi horn and the flute argue gently back and forth. Sokka stands up and heads to the side of the ship. He starts at what he sees. A white shape that should be an iceberg, except that Aang and Katara are there. Sokka takes in a deep breath, then tenses when Iroh arrives next to him. 

“Um... can I be alone for a while?” Sokka says. It feels obliquely wrong to lie to the old man, but trust must come slowly. Iroh leaves his side, and Sokka is afraid that his sister won't spot him until the bison takes off. 

Appa can fly.

Sokka watches them approach. He is not sure if he is relieved or sad when they don't immediately sweep him away. “What are you guys doing here?” he hisses as quietly as he can. The bison is about ten feet below the gunwale, with Katara in his big basket saddle.

“We're tracking you,” Katara says. “Has anybody hurt you?”

Sokka thinks of the twinge in his wrist. But that was an accident. “No,” he lies. “Get this. Zuko, my soulmate... he's the Fire Lord's son. He got exiled for speaking out of turn in a war meeting.” Sokka thinks about divulging where Zuko got the scar, but that piece of information feels just a little too personal. 

“What happened to your parka?”

Sokka tries very hard not to blush as he realizes that he met his soulmate in front of a pack of sailors, had one loud argument, vanished back to his soulmate's cabin, and then, _in full view of said sailors,_ returned wearing different clothes.

“Zuko... lent me... something... comfier.”

Katara stares at him. Aang starts giggling. “Sokka, you didn't!” Katara says, forcing as much outrage into her whisper as she can. 

“No, I didn't, Katara,” Sokka says. “I dunno, maybe it'd be easier if I _did._ He's so... He's so _angry.”_ Sokka looks up at the lights overhead. He chews on his lower lip for a moment, then turns back to his sister. “I don't know if he'll ever stop being angry. Listen, you can't follow us. He won't hurt me. Please—“

“Who are you talking to?”

Sokka jumps when Zuko steps up next to him, then looks over the side. Everything is very still for a moment. Aang waves. “Hi.”

“The Avatar,” Zuko breathes. 

Sokka shakes his head. “No, that's just... um... my sister. She's checking up on me. With her... um.”

“Flying bison,” Zuko fills in. “And Airbending Master tattoos.” He starts to climb over the side. Sokka grabs his arm and hauls him back off the side.

“Go!” Sokka yells. “I'm fine here! Go! Get safe!”

The sailors are all clamoring to get close as Zuko makes another lunge for the side. Sokka stops him with a tackle, and Zuko launches a gout of flame that goes wide. He struggles to his feet, and Sokka wills Zuko to not throw flames at his sister, squeezes his eyes shut, and Zuko exclaims, then curses, then turns and throws a punch that catches Sokka on the top of his head. 

“What are you doing?” Zuko cries.

“I'm stopping you from incinerating my sister!” Sokka yells back. 

“That was the Avatar!” Zuko screams.

Sokka lets go of Zuko and surges to his feet. Zuko scrambles up as well. “I think I know my own sister, Zuko,” Sokka growls. 

“Don't LIE to me!” Zuko's fists are clenched under the pale light. The ragged, uneven slap of the waves against the hull is the only sound for a moment. Sokka feels like he could almost spit fire at the other boy.

“I'm not lying to you! That. Was. My. Sister.”

Zuko closes the distance between them and swings for Sokka's jaw. Sokka reacts smoothly, catches the blow with an upraised arm, and returns it with a punch to the gut. Zuko catches that, and they push each other's arms out wide. Sokka goes for a knee to the groin. Zuko backs away, freeing his hands for a series of rapid jabs. Sokka gets inside Zuko's space. He bobs and weaves, left, then right, then left, then right, taking advantage of Zuko's poor eyesight on his left. Zuko turns into the move. He swings, and although Sokka can barely see from his own left eye, he reads the turn of Zuko's body and ducks. Zuko's haymaker whooshes over Sokka's head. Sokka shoulder-checks him. 

The sailors are making bets, now. Sokka catches a glimpse of Iroh tugging nervously on his beard. 

Zuko staggers a few steps away. Sokka glares at him, then closes the distance again. This time, neither of them focuses very much on defense. Sokka lands blows to the sides, and one to Zuko's head, while Zuko strikes his legs and his chest a few times. They come apart, bruised and slightly dazed, but Sokka aborts his retreat halfway through to lunge at Zuko.

He catches the surprised firebender and bears him down to the deck. Zuko's head clangs against the metal, and a sharp pain instantly rises in the back of Sokka's head. He feels a little woozy. Apparently, that one is going to leave a mark. He and Zuko both stare at each other for a moment. Sokka is straddling his waist, hands on his chest. 

The betting intensifies.

Sokka pushes up and starts to rain down blows on Zuko, but they're a little clumsy and uncoordinated. Pain rushes up through his hands as Zuko deflects blow after blow, and makes a few attempts to return them. Bloody knuckles hit his left cheek, just below the scar. He lands a bleeding knuckle print on Zuko's forehead.

Sokka grabs for Zuko's collar. Zuko's hands go to fight him off, and Sokka struggles, peeling Zuko's hands off of his. He catches a handful of fabric, pulls up, and snarls at Zuko as he lifts. Zuko is resisting with everything he has.

Sokka lets go.

Zuko's good eye gets very wide as his head slams back down on the deck, and abruptly Sokka's world goes black.

+

Jee is painfully aware of his situation. He has shared in General Iroh's shame for five long years, and he knows his way around the General's tenuous, dangerous position in Fire Nation society. He knows that, as the Fire Lord's disfavored, less politically promising child, Zuko is vulnerable from nearly every direction. His sister will almost certainly try to have him killed (or try to kill him herself, if what Jee has heard is true) eventually, the Fire Lord could tire of his continued dishonor and have him eliminated, an Earth Kingdom or Water Tribe assassin could be sent to dispatch him, and the perils of the sea could so easily overtake the _Snapdragon,_ which is nearly sixty years old, and always trying to fall apart on poor Vinh. 

More than that, though, Jee is aware, like much of his crew, of Zuko's _other_ vulnerability. The General has always gushed about his family. Even before his retreat into spiritualism, he had been inordinately proud of his nephew, who had such a grand destiny. _A_ soulmate, _Jee! Imagine that!_

But Iroh could not choose his nephew's soulmate, nor could Zuko himself. And now, with that soulmate asleep—Kyo says that they have at last gone from unconscious to sleeping, though how he can tell, Jee doesn't know—in the General's cabin, Jee wishes he could have convinced the General that a soulmate was a catastrophe for his nephew. 

Jee had hoped that it meant Zuko would come through his troubles by the side of some remarkable Fire Nation girl to lead them to victory and a glorious new future. That was before he returned from Ba Sing Se with Iroh. Before he met the boy. Long before the banishment. 

Jee knew then that Iroh and Zuko were the only ones in the royal family who believed in Zuko's soulmate. Azulon's old line: we don't let the spirits rule us. The banishment told Jee everything he needed to know. And now, his worst fears are confirmed, lying there on the General's spare cot. The boy has the dark complexion and washed-out hair color of the Water Tribe. His eyes are such a bright shade of blue that it even shows through the damaged left. Everything about him screams that he is the Enemy. There lies a vicious Water Tribe savage, so violent and dangerous that he injured himself just to get at Zuko, and they are bound together, soul to soul. There can be no peace, no middle ground between the two. One must be right and one must be wrong.

Zuko has suffered humiliations at the hands of his family and his country. He is furious, and threatened on all sides, and Jee... Jee knows his own country. The Fire Nation will not let Zuko rise to glory with this savage at his side. This Sokka, Jee shudders to think, will destroy the Fire Nation at Zuko's side.

He should kill the boy now. It's what a patriot would do.

Jee looks at the teen on the cot. He crosses into the General's room, staring down at him.

It would be so easy. The boy isn't even a bender. A gout of flame, a lifetime in prison for the murder of the crown prince. Not so much, really. If he can prove his reasons, he might not even go to prison.

Well, he won't go to prison no matter what, because the General will kill him, and then jump into the sea and drown himself. Jee takes a deep breath. His hand is poised, ready to strike the killing blow. Slowly, he lowers it. 

Ultimately, Jee thinks as he adjusts the boy's blanket, it is the General who stops him. Iroh is the one man whose death Jee could not abide. The thought of killing his General is nauseating, and if he kills Sokka, he kills Zuko, and if he kills Zuko, he kills Iroh. 

Sokka stirs. He rolls, stares blearily up at Jee. “Oh. Hi mister boat man. You're the guy in charge of the boat, right? Man?” He looks left and right. “Where am I?”

“You are in General Iroh's cabin. I didn't mean to wake you.”

Sokka sits up and immediately grimaces, then his eyes go wide and he turns and vomits all over the floor. Yup. That's a concussion. Jee steps away from the... mess. 

“Is Zuko awake yet?” Sokka asks. He doesn't ask if Zuko is okay. He knows perfectly well if Zuko is okay, they're in exactly the same shape.

“He's still asleep,” Jee says.

Sokka sighs. “Can you help me get up?”

“I'll go get Healer Kyo. He'll help you out. Lay back down, but stay awake.” Jee turns and hurries out of the cabin.

The thing is, soulmates are supposed to have great destinies, and Jee can't imagine a great destiny for Zuko and Sokka that ends with the Fire Nation winning. Small destinies, sure. They could hide away on some anonymous island together until they die. Or they could challenge everything the Fire Nation is and burn it all to the ground together.

The thing is... well, that's a show Jee doesn't want to miss. Maybe he'll stick around with the General and his nephew. Maybe he'll just see this through wherever it goes, because if destiny can bring these two people together, out of billions, then maybe that really was the Avatar on that flying whatever, and maybe destiny has plans for all this. 

Maybe destiny has plans for all of them.

Or maybe Jee just prefers to stick with General Iroh over the entire rest of the Fire Nation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The guy Iroh knows who's "a little eccentric" is Jeong Jeong and we all know it


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There are a couple of fairly vivid descriptions of being stabbed from the victim's point of view later on in this chapter, and the scene with Aang contains a full-blown panic attack/autism meltdown. You have been warned.
> 
> Also, I've decided to name Zuko's ship the _Snapdragon_ because it doesn't have a canonical name.

Iroh has heard the word “treason” thirty times since they picked up Sokka. The men believe that he is as disturbed by the Water Tribe boy as they are. A couple are disturbed by the fact that he is just that: a boy (This attitude does not prevail. Sozin's decree on the matter long ago has always fought a losing battle against a people that finds it ridiculous. All of the colonies ignore it. Following it is more a matter of fanatical patriotism than anything else). Almost all are disturbed by the fact that he is Water Tribe. This is much more a salient point in the minds of the sailors. If Zuko should express a desire to please his soulmate instead of brawling with him on the deck, there may well be a mutiny.

Iroh would prefer to avoid a mutiny. 

When Lieutenant Jee brings him to speak to Sokka in his cabin, he is surprised that the Water Tribe boy is awake. With some food and some water and a little bit of bracing tea, Sokka is lucid enough for Iroh to begin explaining the situation.

“You must be wondering why Zuko was shouting about the Avatar,” Iroh says.

Sokka frowns. He doesn't respond for a long while, taking two deep sips of his tea before he answers, “actually, I'm beginning to suspect I know part of it,” he admits. Good. He is brighter than he lets on. Iroh already suspected as much, given the resourcefulness of using his connection to Zuko to manipulate the men, but this confirmation is welcome.

“Let me tell you the rest,” Iroh says. “When he was thirteen, Zuko was banished by his father, on the same day he got his scar. He had to be told in a letter because he was unconscious when we left.”

“Yeah, I remember that,” Sokka says “I almost died.”

“So did he,” Iroh replies. “His father formally declared Zuko dishonored and presented him with a task to regain his honor and be allowed back into the Fire Nation. The price of atonement was the capture of the Avatar. Of course, this was no easier or more gentle a task than if he had been sent to find a blue monkey-gator. We wandered for three years, and while we were searching at the South Pole, we saw a light in the sky. Zuko is excitable. He was convinced the light came from the Avatar. I have to admit, it was possible. The Avatar would be an Air Nomad, if he is old, or a Water Tribe bender if they are young. Either way, it would be possible for the Avatar to make that kind of light. They are said to glow with bright light in their eyes and mouth, and an Avatar with tattoos will light those up, too.”

Sokka remains stone faced throughout the telling, which is just as much a tell as if he had blurted the truth. “Tell me, is the Avatar young, or old?” At that, Sokka does twitch a little. 

“How did you know?”

Iroh smiles. “You would not do well in a betting game,” he says. 

Sokka sighs. “If I tell you... what you think I'm going to tell you... you'll go back and hurt my people.”

Iroh sighs. Sometimes, he wishes he had fought to become Fire Lord. From a position of power, he could have ended this war long ago. As it is, his people have made war on Sokka's for a century. His father waged a war of extermination against Sokka's own tribe. The distrust isn't just understandable; it is prudent.

“Sokka, things have changed. Now that he is tied to you, Prince Zuko's fate is in question. Even if he were to capture the Avatar and bring him safely to his father, it might not be enough to save him. I am afraid we may be forced to turn to the Avatar for help.”

Sokka frowns. He glares at Iroh, his lips pursed in thought. “This is really hard to figure out with a concussion,” he admits. “Can I have a problem that I can solve by hitting it with a boomerang?”

“Uncle?”

Iroh sighs very softly. “Prince Zuko. Sit down and talk with us. I know your last meeting did not go well, but I was just telling your _soulmate”_ perhaps belaboring the point will make Zuko pay attention “why you believed his sister was the Avatar.”

“I don't need to listen to Water Tribe lies,” Zuko growls. He starts to leave.

“I believe he was going to tell me about an encounter with the Avatar,” Iroh says. Zuko stiffens. He turns on his heel and glares at Sokka.

Sokka shakes his head, winces, and squeezes his eyes shut. “I. Should not. Have done that.” He slowly opens his eyes again. “I'm not telling Zuko—“

“Really,” Iroh interrupts. He breathes in slowly, through his nose, and out slowly, through his mouth. “We will not get anywhere by seeing each other as enemies. Prince Zuko, Sokka, you must rely on each other. Whatever else your bond means, it ties you together, and working at cross purposes will only hurt you both. Nephew, you are very dear to me, and I will protect you no matter what. The best way that I can protect you right now is to make sure that you listen, and to make sure that Sokka listens to you. I know you don't trust me, Sokka, but because of who you are to my nephew, I would give my own life to save yours. Please, talk with each other.”

Zuko leans against the wall, looking down at the floor. Sokka looks between them, cautious.

“I'll die to protect the Avatar,” he says.

Zuko sneers. “You see, Uncle?”

“Why?” Iroh asks.

Sokka takes a deep breath. “Because he's my sister's soulmate.”

Oh.

That... is not what Iroh expected.

+

Almost a week of travel should not have led him to this. It is, Aang feels, incredibly unfair. 

The Southern Air Temple stands empty, except for the Fire Nation helmet in his hands.

“Aang,” Katara says behind him. “Aang, I'm sorry.”

As it has done from time to time since Kanna told him what happened to his

since Kanna told him her story, the world seems to buzz and rattle in Aang's head. This time, the urge to roll into a little ball and scream is almost overwhelming.

Maybe there is someone further in. The derelict temple yawns ahead of him, but Aang hasn't seen every part of it yet. The Hall of Avatars has yielded nothing to him, but if there is someone, anyone... 

Aang's route takes him to Monk Gyatso's quarters, the old tent at the edge. He'll go there like he always does when the world is too much and it all begins to whine and whistle in his ears. Maybe Monk Gyatso won't be there to comfort him, but the bed will be, that little cot where he can curl up and imagine his mentor is rubbing his back.

The tent is tattered and beaten in by rain and snow and wind, but it still stands, though its bright colors have faded. Aang steps inside.

One helmet might be an anomaly. Kanna might have lied for her own reasons, or heard a distorted version of the events. 

There are nearly thirty Fire Nation soldiers on the ground, long since decayed to skeletal remains. Pressed against the back of the tent, surrounded by the dead, lies a single skeleton in monk's robes. Aang barely sees the pendant around his neck before he does curl up. His hands begin to shake, and he finds himself slowly bending over. The ground seems to retreat from him in slow motion.

Nothing will ever be right again, because Monk Gyatso is dead, he is gone, he can't come back, and nothing will be okay, it can't be, not without Monk Gyatso, and the rest of the Airbenders, the Nomads are gone, Monk Gyatso is dead, there are no more Airbenders, Monk Gyatso is dead, everything is wrong, it can't be put back from something like this, there are no more Airbenders, Aang is the last, Monk Gyatso is dead, there is no—

A hand wraps around his ankle. He hasn't finished curling up. It is Katara, holding his ankle, looking terrified. He tries to breathe, but it is difficult to remember how to breathe. Aang honestly is surprised that he remembers how to stand up. 

Katara hugs him.

The warm, solid pressure of her against his chest is more centering than Monk Gyatso's hand on his back. Aang breathes against her shoulder. 

Monk Gyatso never could bring him out of a meltdown like this. No one could.

Katara can. He clings a little tighter, and he doesn't quite sob, but he knows that will come later. For now, he lets himself be quiet.

+

The missive arrives around the middle of the day, and Zhao makes a note to reward the courier. But first, he has to move very, very quickly. The Blue Cove is nearby, and the Royal Brat must be almost past his ships by now. He lurches to his feet, calling to his secretary. “Signal to Captain Lee that he is to make ready for a departure.” He sprints towards Lee's ship, the _Beetle,_ while the signal goes out behind him. 

The _Beetle_ is neither the largest nor the mightiest ship Zhao has at his command, but it is the fastest. It is nearly as fast as his highness's _Snapdragon._

It will have to be fast enough. Lee tenses at Zhao's arrival on his bridge. Zhao barks a heading and yells “GO!” and so they pull out of port. “Get a man in the watchtower. We're watching for the _Snapdragon._ I want to know the instant we find them, and I want them intercepted!”

Lee barks his orders while Zhao looks out the window. 

Prince Zuko stopped yesterday at the Blue Cove. He bought coal from the local merchants. Suspicious enough, given that the locals always gouge the Fire Navy, more or less openly. But these tales of a Water Tribe boy on the prince's ship...

Well.

Zhao stays on the bridge for hours, until the man in the watchtower calls down to them. Captain Lee moves to intercept, and calls the _Snapdragon_ to.

The Royal Brat has no choice but to stop. As Zhao crosses to the _Snapdragon,_ the prince and Iroh meet him on the deck. Iroh is still his usual self: fat, happy, entirely too convinced of his own wisdom, short, bald, and ridiculous. The prince, however, is a mess of fading bruises and cuts, his knuckles raw, all of it on top of the scars on his face.

“Captain Zhao, did you change ships?” Iroh says, inane as ever.

“It's _Commander_ Zhao now. I came to see if you needed any help. I got word you'd refueled in Blue Cove. That's unusual.” He looks Zuko over. “And his highness seems to have come off worst in a fight.”

“You should see the other guy,” the Royal Brat says. There is barely-restrained fury in his voice.

“I'd like to,” Zhao says. “I hear you have a prisoner.”

Iroh smiles. “Yes. A Water Tribe warrior who tried to attack us. Come, I will introduce you. He is a strange young man.”

Iroh leads him into the ship with his guards. The _Snapdragon_ is ancient and cramped, and they are forced to go single file down the gloomy passages until they come to the brig. There, chained to the wall, is a boy of perhaps as much as sixteen. His face is covered in grey and white. He growls at Zhao. Iroh smiles blandly. “We think his name is Sokka. We are bringing him to the prison at Little Crescent.”

“Why haven't you wiped that ridiculous paint off his face?” Zhao asks. The boy snarls at him.

“Hey, fuck you, fire man,” the boy snaps.

“It's tattooed on,” Zuko says. 

“I don't take off my war paint like a coward!” The boy's yell is startling in close quarters.

“He managed to throw much of our coal overboard before we knew he was there,” Iroh fills in. “The men who you needed for your crew last month used to take the patrol shifts that would have caught him. We had to buy coal quickly.”

“Well, don't bother,” Zhao says. “Kill him now. No need to take him to prison. He's an enemy.”

“Commander Zhao,” Iroh says, scandalized. “He is a child!”

Zhao turns a skeptical eye on Iroh. “Kill him, or I'll kill him for you.”

“You have no authority to tell me how to handle my prisoners,” the Royal Brat says.

“Fine. I'm taking him, then. He's my prisoner now.” Zhao reaches for the boy, and panic registers on the kid's face for just a moment. There is a lie here. Zhao is going to find it. He already knows what the lie is, but he's going to prove it.

As he undoes the kid's restraints, the Water Tribe warrior spirit seems to leave him. Zhao hauls on the boy's collar.

That isn't a tattoo. He spits in the boy's face. The wetness blurs the lines of his “tattoo” and Zhao reaches up to swipe at his face. It wipes away. _Why this deception?_ Zhao wonders. He wipes further, and in the silence of the corridor, he reveals the Water Tribe boy's face.

The scars on his right side begin with a puckered burn where someone else might show a dimple. There is a larger blotch about a thumb's width above that one, and a series of charred mottlings wrapping around his eye socket, over the top of his eyebrow, and on the bridge of his nose. The other side is a single, large burn, shaped almost (almost) like a hand, sparing nothing from his eye to his ear.

They are identical to the prince's scars. The boy's knuckles are torn where the prince's are torn, he is cut where the prince is cut.

“You seem to have come off worst in a fight, boy,” Zhao says.

“You should see the other guy,” the Water Tribe boy replies. All sass, this one.

Zhao's knife comes out in the blink of an eye, the military dagger plunging towards the boy's chest, until the boy moves, and the knife buries itself in his left arm.

The prince screams. Zhao turns to him. He smiles. “Well, no need to be—“

Something punches into his gut. Zhao stares at the Water Tribe boy, who has just dared to strike him. He reaches for his flames. Fire gushes forth, but not from him. Nothing comes to him. There is a sharp, pulling pain, and the boy's eyes are wide. Zhao feels something warm and wet trickle down his legs. Vaguely, he wonders if he has wet himself. He looks down.

Oh. No. It's only blood.

Funny, there shouldn't be that much blood on him. The boy's wounded arm can't bleed that much, right?

Unless it's Zhao's blood. That might make sense, if that's a knife the Water Tribe boy is holding.

Where did he get a knife?

Someone grabs him from behind. There is still fire everywhere. Zhao loses his footing. He slips in something. Someone has let a whole puddle of blood sit there in the middle of the corridor. The Royal Brat isn't exactly running a tight ship, is he?

But the puddle must not be too large. And there are plenty of other things to worry about. There's a fight going on. Everyone is shouting. If only Zhao could focus.

Something warm and wet is on his legs. 

He didn't wet himself, did he? That hasn't happened in a very long time.

And why is there so much fire everywhere?

Zhao makes a note to complain to command about the prince's ship. Defiant prisoners, unruly crew, blood everywhere, and so much fire. They'll take the ship away for sure. He'll get to it right after his nap.

+

Zuko Iroh, and Jee are all firebenders, and about half the crew being with them makes for a huge advantage. Still, escaping from Zhao's ship while fighting off a mutiny is probably the least fun Sokka has ever had, even before factoring in the stab wound. And yeah, the stab wound fucking sucks. Zhao was never going to be fooled by their little deception, but _His Fucking Majesty_ had insisted.

So naturally, this leads to Sokka going through an entire half-hour fight, followed by another two hours of backbreaking labor to keep the ship moving while he's nursing a knife wound in his left arm that he could jam his whole finger into. He sits down, staring at the blood that's all over him, and also all over the ship by now. He's lost track of whose blood it all is. Most of it isn't his. It might mostly be Zhao's. It could also belong to half the crew, or some of Zhao's crew. Either way, he's tracked it into Zuko's cabin, but he's not the first to track it in here.

“Did I ask you to come and bother me?” Zuko snarls from beside him. They are sitting side by side on Zuko's bed.

“No, but I decided to.” Sokka isn't done with this horrible fucking day yet. “Do you remember when I said the disguise wouldn't work?”

“So you're here to gloat.” Zuko rolls his eyes. “You can't take credit for killing Zhao until we confirm it.”

Even as he pushes down a sharp wave of nausea, Sokka fights back the urge to slap Zuko. He knows by now that losing his temper will only lead to a brawl, and he suspects that Zuko provokes fights to distract him from talking about things. It won't work this time. It can't work this time.

“I'm here to make you quit being stupid,” Sokka says. “You almost got us all killed by trying to convince Zhao everything's fine. You can't go back to being Zuko the Good Prince.”

Zuko snorts. “I've never been a good prince.”

Sokka has to fight the urge to hug Zuko this time. It comes up anytime Zuko talks about his childhood. And yeah, maybe this is why they're soulmates, because something in Sokka desperately wants to see what this shattered mess of a human being is like when he's been put back together. 

“Zuko, has it ever occurred to you that maybe you're a perfectly fine prince, and your father is just such a bad Fire Lord that he can't recognize good?”

Zuko stares at Sokka. A flush of frustration warms his cheeks. Iroh is constantly spitting out these nuggets of wisdom, but Sokka is... bad at it. He tries again. “I mean... Ozai is so... um... so bad that he thinks—“

“Please stop torturing that sentence,” Zuko interrupts, “I don't allow torture on my ship.” Sokka is about to respond when Zuko adds “that's why you're not allowed to sing, too.”

Sokka bursts out laughing, because yeah, that stings, but it's also really funny, and he has to admit that being a bad singer is one of the funniest shortcomings it is possible to have. He controls the laugh as quickly as he can and forces himself to be serious.

“Zuko,” he says.

Zuko sighs. “Fine. You're right. You and Uncle are both right, okay? I can have... I can't... I'm not getting... my father will never restore my honor. Not now that I've got... you.” He flops back, bloody hands covering his face. They're all pretty much covered. It's not like Zuko is making it any worse. “If I want to live, I have to fight the Fire Nation.” He peeks out from under his hand. “and I want to live. Uncle doesn't seem to think much of the Fire Nation after all, and he seems happy enough. That means it's possible. Right?”

“Zuko, you're an asshole,” Sokka says. Zuko scoffs. “But never let anyone tell you you're a _stupid_ asshole. I was expecting to have to fight you a lot harder on this. You're only kind of dumb, not all the way stupid.”

“Sokka, you are such a piece of shit,” Zuko says kindly. “Get out of my cabin before I give us both a new scar.”

Sokka smirks as he stands up. “Yes, Your Fucking Majesty.” He leaves the room. He takes over Lin's old quarters. As the only survivor of the mutiny's losing side, Lin himself is rowing a lifeboat back to the port. It's the only open room that doesn't feel tainted by death. He finger-paints his name in blood on the door before he goes to clean himself up. Coming out of the showers in just a towel, Sokka stops short as he encounters Zuko. Zuko is still a mess, though he's gotten his face and hands partly wiped down. The bandage around his arm is nearly completely red. 

Sokka sighs. “Be careful with that wound. If you bleed us to death, I will hunt you down and kill you in the next life.”

Zuko doesn't bleed them to death. In between cleaning blood off of everything and everyone, they keep the ship moving as fast as possible in a straight line, and they talk resources.

The crew is down to thirteen. It's enough to run the ship, provided Sokka, Iroh, and Zuko are able to contribute from time to time. They can't get in a fight and hope to survive, they have no qualified medic, and they are almost certainly being actively followed by the most dangerous navy in the world.

The Northern Water Tribe might take them in, but getting there won't be easy. The Earth Kingdom has some of the best-defended ports in the world, but they'll probably just lock everyone up and throw away the key, except for Iroh, who they'll definitely kill. Iroh claims to be able to call on allies in nearly any place they go, but he admits that it is dangerous to rely too much on his contacts. Sokka... Sokka's sister is soulmates with the fucking Avatar. Sokka can call on Aang. Maybe Katara even has his boomerang. 

When the blood is gone and they feel safe shutting down the engine, Iroh calls them together to plan. Jee sits on the bridge with them, opening up eloquently with “I guess we're all traitors now.”

Sokka raises his hand. “I'm not.”

Zuko shoots him a murderous look, then turns his attention to Jee. “You made your choice.”

Sokka sighs. It seems pretty clear what they have to do, and maybe now, he can get a say in what happens. It would be nice, for once, to have that. “The fastest thing we can do is have Iroh talk to his mystery contacts, and it sounds like there's a decent network of people there. I think we should do that.”

“And tell them what?” Jee asks. “Just talking to people won't help us. We need supplies, and preferably more crew.”

“I think we can acquire that,” Iroh says. “When we stop, we should let any of the crew go who would prefer to go. We will have to be discreet about which port we choose, though.”

Zuko nods. “We should try to find the Avatar. Sokka can help us gain his trust.”

Sokka blinks. Is this acknowledgment? Is this what being taken seriously feels like? It's so foreign. He swallows the whole speech he's been getting ready to deliver, because the main person he needs to convince has just proposed exactly what he was going to. “Um. Exactly. I was going to say that, too.” He looks nervously at Zuko. “If we're with the Avatar, a lot more people are going to listen to us.”

“So how do we find him?” Jee asks.

“I think my people will be able to help us with that,” Iroh says with a tired little smile.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warnings for disaster at sea and imprisonment. Also, Iroh loses a teapot in this one and it's extremely distressing.

The Avatar is in absolutely no way what she was expecting. For one thing, there is the almost manic energy. It seems directionless and innocent at first, but that only lasts for the six hours before she tries to bring up the war. Suddenly, the Avatar freezes, and his soulmate freezes next to him.

The soulmate is different, too. She could swear the Avatar's soulmate is supposed to be from the same nation as the Avatar, but this girl is Water Tribe, through and through (never mind the hair, which apparently hasn't grown for her whole life and now is maybe as long as Suki's thumb is wide—Katara keeps scratching her head, which makes sense if she's not used to hair), she's even a waterbender, and she isn't the exact same age as the Avatar.

Oh yeah. And then there's the other thing. The bit that freaks her out most is the small, insignificant detail that the Avatar is twelve _Unagi-blowing_ years old, rather than an ancient and wizened master of masters. An ancient and wizened master of masters would be easy enough to handle. He'd already know what's going on, and he wouldn't be constantly running away to do anything and everything that might distract him from the world. He wouldn't freeze up at the mention of the war.

Katara looks at her, and quietly, she says, “Suki, please, just let us have the next day or two. We need to rest and... and figure this all out.”

Aang nods stiffly, and before Suki can reply, he beats a hasty retreat, as though the meeting hall is something he must escape from.

Katara sighs. “I'm sorry. It's just...” a few tears leak past her control, and when Suki puts a hand on her shoulder, she begins to weep. “They have my brother,” she says at last. “The Fire Nation. They have my brother. He gave himself up to protect me and Aang. But we can't go back to get him, and Aang needs me—“

Suki interrupts her spiral with a hug. “Katara, you're allowed to be upset. You should be upset about this. And... I'll give you some time. You two take as much time as you need to, okay? It sounds like you both have some grieving to do.”

This is a conversation that Suki has had before. Plenty of girls come to Kyoshi Island because they want to be a part of something important, or because they want to be the best they can be, or in hopes of kicking enough ass to figure out the appropriate motivational platitude for themselves. Lately, though, a lot more girls have come to Kyoshi Island because everywhere else, they've fought and lost and they figure they can win a few if they join up. The ones she can't convince to take care of themselves tend not to come back after the third or fourth time they head out. Sometimes she really wishes Dela was around to help with this, instead of resting comfortably in a shipwreck where administrative duty can't reach her.

Katara sits up straight. There are still a few tears, and she still smolders with that awful determination that's going to burn her up from the inside, but the purpose in her eyes has an edge of hope and obedience to it. “Thank you Suki. Aang and I do need to... to grieve.”

Suki stands up to show Katara to where they'll be staying. Katara follows in her wake. “Right now, you've only got one room. I figure, since...” Suki gestures at Katara's arrow tattoo.

Katara tends to frown when she thinks, Suki notices. “One room. Two beds, please, if you can.”

“Of course we can.” Suki looks down the road towards the beach. Aang has almost certainly gone there. A few of the girls who have been following him around are still straggling off that way. “Are you and he... together?”

Katara shakes her head as Suki lets her into the room. She sits on the bed. There is plenty of room and plenty of spare beds. “After the Air Temple, it just didn't feel right to even _think_ about the whole... soulmates thing.” She laughs bitterly. “I spend my whole life thinking the person I'm supposed to love must be frozen to death, and then I find him and it's the worst month of his life. We met, there was this wild soulbond happiness, and then we both lost everything. What am I supposed to do, come up to him and go 'hey, sorry about your entire culture being murdered, do you wanna be my boyfriend?' I've lost only a tiny part of what he's lost, and I don't think I could handle a boyfriend right now. How is this any kind of romantic?”

“Katara, you know soulmates don't have to be in love, right?” Suki nudges Katara with her elbow. “I've met a couple of sets of soulmates, and one of them were father and son. They led the defense of Omashu Valley together twenty years ago. You can look them up in the village library. Identical twin benders are almost always soulmates, and Kyoshi herself never even thought of being romantic with her soulmate. It doesn't mean you're the perfect love of each other's life, it just means that your destinies are intertwined.”

Katara is very quiet for a few minutes. “I'm not sure how I feel about that,” she says, finally.

+

The Avatar's trail is either the work of an evasive genius or it's almost completely random. It's not until Sokka thinks of checking on what all the islands they seem to go to have in common that anything resembling a pattern becomes visible. 

Zuko has to concede that his soulmate is smart, in the same way that he has to concede that his uncle enjoys tea. The collection of colossally annoying neuroses the Water Tribe boy uses as a personality ninety percent of the time cover up possibly the most fearsome intellect Zuko has ever seen. Now that he has been persuaded—or forced by circumstance—not to treat Sokka as a prisoner, they are beginning to build a mutual respect that is largely based on steering clear of each other. 

The reward for all this relative getting along has been a week of quiet contentment thrumming across their bond. They are working for the same thing. The thought of Sokka no longer stings, although if he allows himself to dwell on the subject...

Zuko doesn't let himself dwell on the subject very often. The thought of home aches like a bone-deep burn. 

What Sokka thinks the Avatar's destinations have in common, what they are chasing now, is giant monsters. Zuko questions the wisdom of taking their very small ship into the waters of elephant koi and the assorted unthinkably huge predators that are said to eat them. Even now, they are brushing off the danger in front of the mildly terrified crew (Uncle's people have supplied enough replacements that the ship is about as viable as it was before: there are seven of the original crew and fifteen of Uncle's White Lotus, nine of whom are elderly men who love pai sho and jasmine tea) with variations on “the Unagi is supposed to be about mammothwhale size, and the Water Tribe hunts those with spears in sealskin boats a quarter this size” and the somewhat more convincing “I'm famous for dragon-killing, aren't I?”

Sokka begins with stories of how this will be easier than mammothwhale hunts and they might not even lose anybody, then Uncle takes a swing at reassuring stories of his own experience fighting sea monsters. By his fourth attempt at contributing, Sokka has transitioned to such melodramatically alarming monsters that the men have a hard time being frightened of them. About then, Zuko has to leave to go to the bridge, but Sokka and Uncle stay behind to keep talking to the men. When Zuko spots them out on the deck from the bridge, the men are laughing behind their hands at Sokka while he talks, and in contrast, Uncle's bona fides seem to make that much more of an impact. Zuko realizes around the time that they sight Kyoshi Island in the distance that Sokka is screwing up his reassurances on purpose. The men are relaxed and confident, but seem to have taken the danger implied by Sokka's first stories to heart, because under the relaxation, they move with purpose.

~~Sokka would make a great second for any commander.~~

“I wish I'd had someone like him for my second in command at Ba Sing Se,” Jee says from his post at the wheel. “That kid can play a crew like a flute.”

Zuko grunts in assent. “He's terrified,” he says. “Look at the way he keeps scratching the back of his neck. He's reaching for that fucking boomerang he won't shut up about.”

Jee turns to inspect him. Zuko is a little surprised that Uncle doesn't notice the sudden tension from clear down on the deck. “You spend a lot of time watching him?”

“You think I stay so far away from him by accident?”

Zuko can feel Jee's eyes boring into his skull. 

“Lieutenant, if you have something to say, say it.”

Jee shakes his head. “I don't think I've ever seen two people hate each other so productively in my life.”

Zuko elects to ignore that. If hating each other productively is the best they can do, he can work with it. Below, Sokka and Uncle head back into the superstructure, and a few moments later they are on the bridge. “Is there anyone left on the crew that would trust you with a canoe?” Zuko asks.

Sokka jumps a little at being spoken to directly. “Um. Yeah. All of them. Being good with boats is how I survived in, like, two thirds of the stories.”

Zuko shrugs. He looks out at the growing silhouette of Kyoshi Island. 

“You know, they're not going to trust us,” Sokka says. “I mean, we're blowing in on a Fire Navy ship, with the crown prince and a famous general, and I might work as a reference if you and I weren't soulmates, but everyone is going to assume I'm on your side.”

“You _are_ on my side,” Zuko shoots back.

_”We_ are on _our_ side, thank you very much,” Sokka says. “I'm _hoping_ we'll be on the Avatar's side pretty soon, though.”

Zuko watches the ocean for several minutes. Jee gives orders once or twice, and when they finally approach the harbor and start slowing down to land, naturally, everything goes completely to shit all at once.

First, something orange flashes past outside of the bridge. The wave that smashes into the side of the ship immediately afterward tilts them far enough that Uncle's third-favorite tea pot slides right off of the counter it's been perched on for weeks and smashes on the floor. The sea monster that rears out of the harbor slams into them then, rocking the _Snapdragon_ even further to the right. Zuko clings to the nearest chair, which happens to be bolted down. Uncle catches the counter, Lieutenant Jee latches onto Uncle, and Sokka doesn't cling to anything: he just tilts back against the lean and rides it, reaching out to rest a hand against the floor. 

~~Holy shit that's sexy.~~

They are nearly forty five degrees off of upright in seconds, and Jee yells “hard to port and full speed ahead!” 

Sokaa gathers himself and leaps for the wheel. He almost makes it. Zuko can see exactly how short he'll come, and he lunges from his position, slamming into Sokka. Before Zuko hits the starboard bulkhead, he hears the sound of the wheel cranking over and the rudder heaving to. Water splashes, the engines roar, and slowly, their ship twists out of the Unagi's grasp. Jee runs to the wheel as Sokka bolts for the ladder to the top of the bridge. Zuko scrambles to his feet and looks out the window. The barbels on the Unagi's streamlined face are nearly as thick as his biceps, its crest is upright and its massive teeth bared. The ship is still swinging, and as it crosses level, it slams into the giant eel. 

The creature shrieks, so loud that Zuko's bad ear erupts in a cacophony of ringing and his good ear twinges along, and then it immediately sprays a punishing torrent of water at them. Zuko jumps aside just as the pressure sends the port window smashing across the room. The starboard window blows out, too, shards of shattered glass screaming out into the water like so many knives. They start swinging back to starboard as Jee gets to the wheel and adjusts their heading. Zuko rushes to the ladder Sokka just took. The little trapdoor at the top of the bridge leads to the most precarious, terrifying space on the whole ship, and naturally, Zuko's soulmate is up there. Zuko opens the trapdoor to hear Sokka yelling.

“—very uncool, mister eel, sir, I am trying to find my sister!”

the Unagi shrieks again, and its snout darts forward. Sokka lets himself slide back away from the creature, and Zuko reaches out to catch his arm as he passes. The weight of both of them slams Zuko's ribs against the trap door's frame, and his breath escapes with an agonized grunt. “Fuck!” Sokka yells. “Did you just break our ribs?”

A wave of heat washes over them as the ship begins to lean back to port, and this time, when the Unagi shrieks, it also retreats. Another wave of heat follows, and a sustained roar. Zuko turns to see Uncle throwing out a jet of flame powerful enough to slow the listing of the ship. Sokka scrambles to his feet while they slowly stabilize, and Zuko scans the horizon to find...

“There! Sokka, high astern!”

Sokka turns and he cups his hands to his mouth and shouts, with incredible volume “KATARA!” in the direction of the six-legged flying whatever that the Avatar apparently runs around on. “KATARA, WE NEED TO TALK!”

The Avatar continues to leave. Sokka stamps his foot. “KATARA, AT LEAST GIVE ME BACK MY BOOMERANG!”

The Avatar's creature heads up into the clouds. Zuko pulls himself up onto the top of the bridge with Sokka.

“Fuck,” Sokka whispers.

Zuko looks up, and he looks back down at the deck, and then he sighs. He stands there with Sokka for a while. The deck stops swinging, but it comes to rest listing noticeably to starboard. They come into the bay and there are warriors in traditional dress lined up along the margins of the beach, all while Sokka stares hopefully at the sky.

Zuko climbs back down with a lot of grunting and pain, and Sokka follows him. Uncle is picking up the pieces of his broken teapot. “Was anybody hurt?” Sokka asks.

Jee nods. “Nothing terrible. A couple of broken arms, some sprains.”

“No anchors,” Iroh says to Jee. “Be ready to run if the Unagi returns. We will go on the _Lily Pad_ to ask them about the Avatar. It would be a good idea to set up a gesture of trust, to alleviate their suspicions.”

Jee blinks. “That might be why we're still leaning so bad,” he says. He leans out of the space where the window used to be and calls out “I think the _Lily Pad_ got knocked around! Go put it right!”

“We can't go in without Sokka's sister there,” Zuko exclaims. “They were probably going to throw us in prison even with them there! They'll never believe us now!”

“Prince Zuko, you must try to have a little faith in diplomacy. Now, I suggest we show them we are harmless somehow.”

“We could try shackling ourselves,” Zuko mutters.

“Zuko, quit being dramatic,” Sokka scolds, as though this is unreasonable. But they won't be dissuaded. The planning begins, and by the time Zuko, Sokka, and Uncle have finished loading up the little launch, the crew has the _Lily Pad_ back to center. It seems to have fixed the _Snapdragon's_ listing problem, and they are fairly sure the little boat wasn't damaged too badly.

It does still run when they get it out into the water, but it leaks worse than a palace servant. Zuko deliberately runs the little boat as far aground as he can. They'll have to bale and repair it. One of the uniformed warriors approaches, a wedge of green against pale sand, and Zuko drops to his knees in a gesture of surrender. Uncle and Sokka follow suit.

The warrior speaks.

+

“Which one of you is Sokka?”

There are three men kneeling on the sand. One of them clearly isn't Sokka: his hair is grey and he is built like a well-worn robe. That leaves the two boys, and when they both look up, it's pretty clear which one of them it is. The later afternoon sunlight picks out their skin tones clearly, and Suki flips one fan up under his chin. As he feels the blades at the end of it, he goes completely rigid. Suki smiles at him. “Your sister didn't tell me how cute you are,” she says. “I'm almost sorry I have to throw you in prison.”

Sokka's right eye getS very wide. His left, of course, remains pretty much immobile, but then the old man says “before you take us to prison, may I introduce myself?”

Suki has heard that tone of voice before. It's the tone of someone who feels he is about to win. She moves, as fast as she can, swinging hard for the old man's throat. This is not the time to be merciful or indecisive, and if she kills him, she kills him, but either way, he won't be able to hurt anyone. 

He catches her attack almost serenely, but instead of counterpunching, he just sets himself up to defend. The warriors will charge if she gives the signal, or looks like she might need help, but they won't reveal their positions needlessly. Surely some have been spotted, but many more must still be hidden.

Suki flashes into a series of strikes, lefts and rights and jabs that should overwhelm anyone's defenses. The old man moves with shocking speed, and within five seconds, she is confident that he could kill her if he were to try. She stops attacking and glares at him. “Introduce yourself, then.”

“My name is Iroh. I am a retired Fire Nation general and a member of the royal family.” He smiles. “I am sure I would not be welcome at a family reunion right now.”

Suki breathes slowly, in through the nose, out through the mouth, trying to center herself. “This is my nephew Zuko,” Iroh continues, and she believes him. The Dragon of the West is a very unlikely personage to meet, but so is the Avatar, and the proof is in the way he fights. “I see you already know who Sokka is.”

“You come to Kyoshi Island after all the Kyoshi warriors you killed?” Suki aims a fan at him. She is terrified, but no one will ever know. That's one thing the face paint does for them. “You can fight me, but you can't fight all of us.”

Iroh makes a patting gesture in the air. “I do not wish to fight anyone, but it is a fool who lets himself be slashed to ribbons. We are trying to help the Avatar, not hunt him.”

“Prove it,” Suki snarls.

“May I wave to my ship?” Iroh asks.

Suki blinks. She signals the warriors, and there are a few rustling noises as they get further under cover. “Go ahead,” Suki says.

Iroh turns and waves vigorously. 

A catapult plunges off the side of the ship. “Check inside our boat,” Iroh suggests.

Suki signals the warriors again, and a group of six emerges from the woods and comes to her side. 

“Check in their boat,” Suki orders.

The girls move forwards, covering each other's backs, until one of them opens up the boat's little cabin, and gasps. “Suki. Um... There's about sixty swords, and a whole lot of armor, and a bunch of money in here.”

Iroh smiles serenely. “All of our weapons.”

Suki looks into his eyes. This man is dangerous. He is beyond dangerous. And she is beginning to suspect he is also completely sincere.

“You're still going to prison,” Suki says. “But you're going to help us unload this stuff first.”

+

Katara is still fiddling with the boomerang. Aang isn't dumb. He knows what the weapon means to her, even if it does strike him as strange to be sentimental over a tool of violence. She's been handling their encounter with Sokka... poorly.

He has exhausted the comforting things he can say to her. Katara doesn't handle monk-logic very well; she says she finds it nihilistic and disturbing. Most of the ways Aang has been taught to handle his loved ones being in danger don't work, and _“if you tell me to let go of my brother again, I will put you back in an iceberg”_ is... a motivating sentence. Telling her he is sure Sokka is okay leads to a recitation of how close the Unagi was to him, ~~and also Aang is not sure of that at all and doesn't like to lie.~~ Reminding her that he is there for her makes her feel guilty, which makes sense and also makes him sad.

So Aang is relieved when he spots the familiar profile of Omashu in the distance. A week of stormy Katara, he is learning, is a difficult thing to take alone. Maybe the city will make things better.

It's worked before. Granted, that was with Bumi in the picture, and Katara might not like... but then, it's been a hundred years. Katara... won't be meeting Bumi.

Aang draws in a breath to point out the city, and Katara turns and spots it before he can speak. “Oh!” she says. 

Aang nods. “That's Omashu! My friend Bumi used to cheer me up when I felt bad by riding the mail carts here.”

Katara sighs. “Aang, this isn't going to go away because I go riding around on... what's a mail cart? No, no, _focus, Katara.”_ This is a habit Aang has noticed. Sometimes, Katara needs to process things out loud, and on the rare occasions when she talks herself through a difficult task, she seems to judge herself harshly. It worries him. “Aang, I don't know if I'll ever see my brother again. He... he looked pretty at home on that ship. You saw him laughing with those sailors. And then... the Unagi...”

“I knew we shouldn't have risked it,” Aang says. He has not said this before, because he is terribly afraid that he has broken his vows, that summoning the Unagi has soaked his hands in blood, and he is beginning to see that there is a war going on, and he is the Avatar, and there is no way he gets out of

Anyway, this isn't about him.

“I almost lost him once. When he got that burn on his face.” Katara sighs. “I was just learning to waterbend, starting to figure out that I could make the water warm or cold or freeze it. We were standing around the fire. I was cooking, and we were talking about penguin sledding. And then, he started screaming, and his face was burning, and he fell into the fire...” She sighs. “I was able to heal him with waterbending, just a tiny bit. I don't know how I did it, but I did it, for just a few seconds. It's how I knew it could be done. But no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't do it again for the entire time he was healing. He almost died, and I wasn't... I wasn't good enough to stop it. He's not a bender, Aang. He needs to be protected.”

Aang looks down at the city. Some of the details are starting to become clear. He can see the network of mail carts, and the green roofs dotting the four huge pyramids. The artfully wound streets are full of color, a riot of greens and yellows, sprinkled with pinks, purples, and blues.

“You're worried about his loyalty,” Aang says. Neither of them has said it so bluntly, but it's true. Sokka is supposed to share some kind of destiny with Zuko. It's clear what destiny has in mind for Aang and Katara. A quest to restore balance, to depose a dictator. Zuko is the son of the dictator they're trying to depose. If he has a great destiny, then it must be intertwined with theirs, but that doesn't say anything about how.

There are some options that aren't pretty. Aang prefers to focus on options that let them be friends, but so far Zuko has thrown fire at Aang and Katara and Appa, and he has tracked and followed them to Kyoshi Island. 

With luck, the Kyoshi Warriors have them in hand, and they'll be able to come back and sort this all out soon. More likely, Zuko and Sokka escaped, and they're likely enough to encounter them again.

But when they do, it might be a fight.

Katara stares at Aang.

She doesn't deny it.

Aang looks ahead, his eyes searching out the mail cart access platform that he and Bumi hung out on ~~six months~~ a hundred years ago.

It's the one draped with orange and yellow Air Nomad festival banners. This detail is new and surprising. 

Katara notices his distraction. “Aang?”

Aang reaches for his staff. “I think someone is inviting me in.” He points, and Katara frowns. They have just begun to discuss loyalty and suspicion. Here is a word problem in suspicion.

+

It is late in the morning, and Father is unsettled. Azula can tell because seven of Father's servants have winced very slightly in her presence. Normally, only one or two will have new burns. So many indicates a military defeat, an assassination attempt, a riot, or...

Zuko.

An assassin or a riot are both things that Azula would be aware of by this point in the day, so she can safely rule them out. It is safe to discuss assassins, and there is no need to quell the topic of unrest should it arise.

There are no major offensives underway that might be the defeat in question. That means a defeat severe enough to warrant seven burnings would be the fall of a city.

Father does not appear to the court during luncheon.

Father does not appear to the court during dinner.

Azula is burning with curiosity. Which city has fallen? It's the only thing extreme enough to have kept Father away from the court for so long.

She is summoned to see Father in the throne room a few hours before sunrise. The wall of flames is out, and Father has eaten recently: there is the faintest whiff of spices in the air.

“I have a task for you, Azula,” Father says.

Azula blinks. Whatever has gone wrong, Father is about to assign her to fix it. She's going to prove herself. She's going to go out into the world, and Father is going to _reward_ her, with more responsibilities, more power, more, just that, more unto itself.

“Tell me what it is, and it will be done.”

Father smiles. The expression is barely visible. He is in the shadows today. “That is why I am calling on you. Commander Zhao has just arrived in the capital, you see. You remember I had him keeping an eye on your brother.”

Azula blinks. If Commander Zhao is here, then that means that he is not tracking Zuko. If he is not tracking Zuko, then either Zuko has chosen to evade him or he is dead. 

Azula knows what she is, she understands her training. She is an enforcer. A princess she may be, but she is easily the most dangerous person in any room that does not contain Father. If Zuko is dead, she is being sent to avenge him since, exile or no, he was royal. But that decision would be quick. Father has been sequestered for the whole day, which means whatever is happening is complex.

Zuko is alive.

“How is Commander Zhao?” Azula asks.

“He is in terrible pain. He was stabbed in the gut by a Water Tribe savage, a boy of about fifteen, while visiting your brother's ship. He was also burned by your uncle in the fighting.”

Azula absorbs this information. Her brother was holding a Water Tribe boy prisoner, but allowed the boy to attack Zhao.

“He hired an assassin?” Azula reasons.

“I thought so at first, too. So did Zhao, until he met with some deserters from your brother's crew on the way to meet with me. It seems the savage is from the Southern Water Tribe. Your brother shares scars with him. They have identical burns on their faces. I called on one of our sages, who explained that this might be a sign that they are bound together by some great destiny. To me, it is a sign that your brother's exile is at an end.”

“Father?” Azula says.

“The deserters from the _Snapdragon_ also claimed that the Southern Water Tribe had sent someone after them on a _flying bison,_ someone with an airbending master's tattoos. Someone your brother believes is the Avatar.”

Oh.

This is... not something Azula was prepared for.

“I am sending you to find your brother. As my representative, you will discover why he attacked Commander Zhao. You will discern the truth about this rumored Avatar. You will become familiar with your brother's progress. And you will learn about this savage boy. In response to what you learn, you will end your brother's exile. If he kills or captures the Avatar, he will of course be welcomed back to us with open arms. If this destiny of his seems to threaten the Fire Nation, then his exile will have to end while he is still abroad. Do you understand?”

Azula understands, but she still has one question. “What if there is no Avatar?”

“Then take your brother to me anyway. I will not have an exiled prince running around with savages. If the savage boy exists, kill him.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> God, Ozai just... he sucks. He just sucks.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not sure if there are any potential triggers in this one? Um, there's a scene with Sokka, Zuko, and Iroh in a prison cell, so if you have trouble with that... be warned, I guess, but this chapter is fairly mild.

Bumi is not nervous. The single form that drops down towards him on an Air nomad glider is neither terrifying nor dismaying. He has known for a hundred years that Aang gave up, that he fled. Now, he has to reassess. Whatever happened to Aang, it was far stranger than he could have foreseen.

His first instinct, when he got the letter with the Lotus Seal, had been to find the boy, test him, try to understand what happened.

His advisors had talked him out of that one four times in the first three days.

The thing is, he thought Aang was dead. The letter has left him confused and worried.

It had taken nearly ten years of searching to find the Avatar's soulmate, and the man had appreciated Bumi's offer of protection but held himself distant from the city, an anonymous wanderer who died comfortably in bed at ninety-eight. 

Bumi is surprised to see that his friend survived that, but as Aang drops to the ground in front of him, on almost the same exact spot he last saw him, the greater surprise comes with the confirmation of the letter's strangest detail.

He is still young, and still untrained.

This is the same boy, it's achingly clear. A part of Bumi claws to be mysterious and cryptic. It has kept Omashu safe from the Fire Nation, that they believe he is ineffective, weak, and mad, but the lotus letter in his hand is a clear, if indirect, mandate. If Aang were to arrive unheralded, it would be different.

Instead, Bumi says “you haven't aged a day, Aang. Do you recognize me?”

Aang peers closely at him, and then, quietly, he says “Bumi?”

Bumi smiles. “Still won't grow hair, huh?”

Aang turns and gestures, and Appa—it'll be good to see Appa again, too—begins to descend. “My soulmate grows hers, though. It's getting pretty long.”

“Soulmate?” Bumi asks.

Aang nods. “A girl from the Southern Water Tribe. Her name is Katara.”

Bumi frowns. “Fourteen years old,” he guesses. He is not guessing.

Aang nods. Bumi can see the girl, approaching between flapping orange and yellow banners. Word of this will be all over the city by nightfall. _”King Bumi set out a welcome for an Air Nomad and then someone showed up with a real flying bison!”_

“How did you know she was fourteen?” Aang asks.

“Your last soulmate died at ninety-eight,” Bumi says. “I thought you were gone, too, until I got this letter.” He hands it over. He already knows what it says.

Aang unrolls the parchment.

_From Breath-of-Flames to Stoneface_

_Greetings, noble colleague,_

_I move the Snapdragon to 4-5 center, countering. Your move reveals the Bent Tree at 3-3 center. The Snapdragon is reverse, uncovered. The Bent Tree is obverse, covered, unpromoted. I place the White Lotus at 2-2 center._

Aang stares at him. “This is Pai Sho moves,” he says, confused, as his soulmate lands Appa behind him. Bumi reaches out to pat Appa's snout.

“No no, it says it clear as day. Listen. 'From Iroh to Bumi: this message contains orders. I am approaching the southwest coast of the Earth Kingdom, but I don't know what my situation will be once I get there. The Avatar has been found and is at large. He is an Air Nomad. I am moving as covertly as I can, and I haven't been able to make contact with the Avatar, but I would like to. The Avatar is traveling openly, but might avoid contact, and I believe he still needs training. If you can help him, you must.' It's really very plain.”

Aang stares at him, and then at the scroll, and then at him again.

“I think we need to talk,” his soulmate fills in when he seems to be at a loss for words.

+

There are several things bothering Katara. One of them is the idea that Aang had a soulmate before her, and that he somehow survived their death. This, she is aware, she will be discussing with him later. There are more urgent matters to attend to.

Over a lavish private dinner, Bumi (who looks like every one of his hundred and twelve years hit him directly in the face) explains that he is part of a network of people dedicated to helping the Avatar keep peace and balance. He explains that one of the most powerful members is a retired Fire Nation general named Iroh, and that this General Iroh is the one who sent out the alert. Katara is not sure how much she trusts Bumi, but Aang trusts him completely, and Katara trusts Aang.

“I can only help so much,” Bumi says, “although if you come back when you're ready to learn earthbending, I'll be happy to teach you. For now, I'd like to send you to General Iroh. He'll be able to help you get to the Northern Water Tribe to find a waterbending master. For both of you. He's traveling on a ship called the _Snapdragon,_ and he's probably on your trail.” Bumi pounds a fist down on the stone table, and a model of a Fire Nation ship erupts from the surface. A second pound brings up a statue, about a foot tall, of a stocky, balding man with a huge, well-sculpted beard. “That is General Iroh's ship, and General Iroh himself. He has grey hair now. Oh! You might see his nephew, too.” He pounds again, and a slim boy, taller than the general, emerges from the table. His hair is shaved away except for a genuinely atrocious ponytail. His face is wrinkled. “He's hard to miss! He has burns all across the top of his face. His name is—“

“Zuko,” Katara breathes. “We've met. He tried to kill me.”

Bumi hesitates. He looks at Katara, then at Aang. Katara sees Aang nod in confirmation beside her. 

“Well... I'm sure he didn't mean anything by it.”

+

“How's my favorite prisoner?” Suki asks, and _spirits,_ but Sokka wishes she was his soulmate instead of Zuko. A solid week and a half of nightly I-told-you-so has left things a little... chilly in their shared cell. 

Sokka does not feel the slightest bit of guilt when he leans against the bars and says “better, now that you're here.”

Suki does not look up from where she is passing the evening meal into Iroh's cell. “You, Water Tribe, are not my favorite.”

“I am doing very well, thank you,” Iroh says. He fumbles his restrained hands into holding up his soup and drinks deeply. “You have changed your hairstyle. I like it, but I thought the other girls had talked you out of the braid.”

As Iroh and Suki continue to chat, Sokka reflects that the feeling of disloyalty to Zuko is very muffled by the fact that Suki refuses, literally, to give him the time of day. He has asked her a couple of times, only to be told that there are windows.

“You know you only annoy her that way,” Zuko says from his position lounging on the bunk. They are not sharing a double cell. They are locked into a single-occupant cell together because Suki is evil. It sucks profoundly, ~~but there are worse people to be stuck in a cell with than Zuko,~~ and he very much wants it to be over, preferably in a way that involves Suki admitting that he is correct, innocent, cool, and attractive.

“I don't see why,” Sokka says, glaring at Suki's damnably attractive back. The braid looks good. “After all, I'm correct, innocent, cool, and attractive.”

“Really?” Suki says. “Because we've been over this, Water Tribe, and I'm correct, not gullible, smarter than that, and prettier than you.”

There's the most beautiful girl Sokka's ever seen, calling him a traitor, a threat, a liar, and not pretty. He wishes he had enough space that he could walk away from her without the gesture seeming childish, but there is only the cell, ten feet by ten feet, and a good amount of it taken up by Zuko, in his restraints on the single bed. They know he and Zuko aren't a couple, don't even like each other. They keep them together because they think it's funny. Sokka doesn't mind because it's at least taught them not to get into a fistfight at the first opportunity. They haven't knocked each other out even once since they, as Iroh puts it, “moved in together.”

The door flies open, and one of the younger girls comes rushing in, interrupting Suki in the middle of unpacking Sokka and Zuko's dinner. The girl hands Suki a sealed scroll, and Suki passes the soup indifferently into Zuko and Sokka's cell as she swishes out of the little stockade. Before the door swings to, Sokka hears Suki say, puzzled, “Omashu?”

“I'm wearing metal gloves,” Zuko points out. Sokka turns. His soulmate is sitting up, looking pointedly at their food. Sokka grabs one of the bowls and starts to help Zuko eat. He'll get his later. He likes it cold, anyway.

“What do you suppose that was about?” Sokka asks.

“I don't know,” Zuko says. “You and Uncle are the planners and Kyoshi Warrior experts."

“I admit that my knowledge is out of date,” Iroh says. Sokka glances and sees the old firebender sitting to meditate. 

“I told you,” Zuko begins, and Sokka sighs. He'll dutifully keep feeding Zuko because they all have to keep their strength up, but he really wishes he could leverage _something_ to get him to stop with the lecture _every single night._ “I told you it was a bad idea while we were loading all those swords on the _Lily Pad,_ I told you we should just try to follow the Avatar.”

Sokka interrupts, “Zuko, if you give us this lecture again, I'll sing. Don't think I won't.”

Zuko glares at him. “Suki would know how bad you sing.”

Sokka considers that. She already doesn't like him. Any delusions that she might have a secret crush are buried under a mountain of distrust. “I actually care less about impressing her than about not hearing this again. Because you know what? You're right. We should have gone after Aang and Katara. They would have gotten away, but we wouldn't be in prison. So... I'm sorry. But I swear on the Moon and Every Star that if I have to hear about how you're right one more time, I am going to sing every single song I know, and I'm going to enjoy them. Really belt them out.”

“Uncle,” Zuko protests.

“I do not want that to happen any more than you do, Zuko, but it sounds as though you are the only one who can prevent it.”

Zuko glares at Iroh and mutters “traitor.” Sokka has been fairly certain for days that Iroh can escape anytime he wishes, and they will not be imprisoned any longer than Iroh is willing to tolerate. He just has no idea where the man's patience ends. Zuko knows as well as any of them that if Iroh wants to stop Sokka, he absolutely can. He turns his attention from his unhelpful uncle to Sokka. “You really admit I'm right?”

“Yes,” Sokka says sincerely. “Zuko, I am so sorry I called you a paranoid medium-rare control freak. You were right and I should have listened.”

Zuko gets dimples when he smirks. Sokka had to pay attention to notice them, but now that he sees them it takes all the sting out of the smug little smile. “I'm sorry I told you that wasn't even clever. I was lying. It was kinda funny.”

Sokka rolls his eyes. “It won't be much longer, okay? If they don't let us out soon, we'll break out. Or your painfully awesome uncle will do it.”

Zuko sighs. “I know. We'll catch them. I didn't spend years looking for the Avatar just to lose him the minute I met him.” He stares up at the ceiling. “I _would_ be able to track him and capture him if I had anywhere to take him.”

“Yeah, I know, I'm real inconvenient,” Sokka grumbles, setting down the empty bowl. He hates it when Zuko talks about his exile. It sucks, all around, really, because Zuko is blaming him, at least partially, for something that is not his fault. Sokka is not the one who exiled Zuko, and he is not the Fire Lord who instituted a national policy of endless war against the other nations, and he definitely did not choose to be soulmates with a _reasonably cautious_ medium-rare control freak.

“What, no,” Zuko says. “Sokka, the situation is inconvenient, but it's not like it's your fault. I just really wish it was as simple as kidnapping a twelve-year-old.”

“Aang's tattoos are supposed to mean he's an airbending master, according to the village council,” Sokka says. “I asked about Katara's tattoos after Mom... um... after we lost Mom. I wanted to understand all the stuff I'd taken for granted.” He looks Zuko up and down. “You have a little sister who's some kind of firebending prodigy, right? Your uncle said so. Could you keep her contained on the ship? Could you do it if she could fly?”

Zuko shudders. “I really don't want to imagine Azula flying.”

“I'm pretty sure that's what trying to keep Aang prisoner would be like, except he'd laugh at you more. I feel like he's a laugher.”

Zuko cracks a smile at that.

“Airbenders _were_ renowned for their humor,” Iroh says, and Zuko chuckles slightly. This is the most extreme display of positivity Sokka has seen from him since they put his hands in the restraints.

Suki comes back in. “We're going to Port Shu,” she says. She pulls out a bundle, something bulky and angular, wrapped in cloth. She unwraps it, and Sokka's heart leaps. “MY BOOMERANG!” He yells. “You must have gotten that from Katara! Is she okay? Did she say anything to you?”

+

A week and a half of sitting in the bay has lessened Jee's terror of the Unagi. For one thing, there are three firebenders and an earthbender aboard the _Snapdragon,_ which is apparently enough to scare off the giant eel. For another, it mostly just chases around the elephant koi. 

On the other hand, of course, it feels rather like he's been sitting a siege, and he's not used to doing that without his general. The Kyoshi Warriors line the beach and keep up a constant watch. The catapult, irretrievably distant at the bottom of the bay, would be a great comfort. Naturally, he can't have that. He's just had to sit and stare down the legendary troupe of fighters as though he is not in command of a skeleton crew that is nearly half elderly pai sho players.

When Crewman Lee (the older one) bursts into Jee's quarters, he's actually a little relieved, because something is probably happening now.

“Sir, they've relaunched the _Lily Pad._ General Iroh, Prince Zuko, and the Water Tribe boy are aboard with... um... a lot of Kyoshi Warriors,” Crewman Lee glances at the bulkhead, in the general direction of shore and probably the _Lily Pad._ He looks nervous. That's fair. If the Kyoshi Warriors are here to fight, they are all definitely going to die.

“Get Crewman Dayo and Mister Hom down to the launch bay.” Jee stands up, starting down there himself. “Standing order: do not provoke the Kyoshi Warriors. You provoke the Kyoshi Warriors and we all die.”

Crewman Lee hurries off to give orders, and Dayo and Mister Hom, Jee's two most dignified crewmen, flank him just as they start opening the launch bay. The _Lily Pad_ limps in, clearly taking on water just a little, and much more loaded down than usual. One of the Kyoshi warriors steps off first. She approaches Jee, looks him up and down cooly, and nods. “You must be Lieutenant Jee,” she says. More warriors step off the _Lily Pad_ behind her. Zuko, Sokka, and the General step off together, looking a little tired, but possibly better fed than they were before. Jee offers the warrior his hand. She takes it in a firm clasp and lets go quickly. “You're loyal to your commander. I like that.” She hands him a letter, and he looks down at it. “This arrived from Omashu yesterday evening. Looks like we all have new orders.” Jee unrolls the paper as the General reaches him and looks over his shoulder. 

Their orders, such as they are, are remarkably vague. Go north, attempt to meet up with the Avatar. They've been given a series of places the Avatar will likely stop, and about when he'll be there. Their next scheduled stop, therefore, is a little town known for taking in Fire Nation deserters, a port called Six Piers Burning, where trade both legal and illegal flourishes. Jee would never have gone there before he met the General.

Oh yeah, and they're filling out the rest of their crew positions with Kyoshi Warriors. Well, in for assaulting an officer, in for high treason. Jee looks at the selection of warriors. “How much experience do your people have with ships?” he asks.

The Kyoshi Warrior smiles. “More than you think,” she assures him.

She's right. The next couple of days bear that out, as they run fast for Six Piers Burning. Prince Zuko takes to long planning sessions and asking his Water Tribe boy—asking Sokka—about the Avatar and Sokka's sister at odd times. The General incorporates the Kyoshi Warriors into music night, getting some of them to sing, or dance, or play an instrument. Sokka begins picking up the guqin and pipa with surprising speed. The Kyoshi Warriors, meanwhile, take away a huge chunk of the burden of running the ship. They're competent, smart, fast learners, and apparently the ones here to be crew were selected for their sea legs. He is even beginning to trust them.

They don't get any real excitement on board until Sokka gets into another fight with Prince Zuko. Really, it's been far too long since he last heard them yelling at each other, and some of the tension leaks out of Jee as his lunch is interrupted by a loud “don't tell me what to do!”

Jee looks up, as does everyone else, as Zuko storms into the mess. Sokka follows him, looking distressed. “I wasn't telling you what to do,” he begins.

“'Zuko, don't try talking to them when we meet them,'” Zuko quips, and yeah, that sounds like he was telling Zuko what to do.

“I just meant that you... uh... sometimes aren't... great at... um. Talking?” A stellar effort. The whole mess goes even quieter as Zuko turns to face Sokka. 

Sokka has the social graces to know he should be cringing a little. Zuko takes in a deep breath. “So I can't talk without making an idiot of myself?”

“I didn't mean it like that,” Sokka says. “It's just that you're not a diplomat. And I know my sister, so she'll listen to me more.”

Zuko's walk to the communal stew pots is not a stomp largely by virtue of the fact he would object to hearing it called that. “I don't see why anyone would listen to you at all. You're an asshole.”

“That is true, but I am also charming.” Sokka hurries behind Zuko, grabbing an extra spoon (Zuko always grabs chopsticks by mistake on stew days: Sokka drops the spoon in Zuko's bowl next to his chopsticks).

“You are as charming as an emu-camel.”

Sokka watches Zuko serving himself stew. “I have no idea what an emu-camel is.”

“It's gangly, awkward, mean, smelly, and likes to spit on people.” Zuko smiles viciously. “Just like you.”

“I don't spit on people and I am _very_ well-proportioned.”

Zuko sets his bowl down on the nearest level surface, and he reaches out to flick Sokka's right ear. Point made, he picks up his bowl again and heads for Jee's table.

Oh no.

Zuko sits. Jee looks down at his own stew. It's only half finished.

“Prince Zuko,” Jee says, “please don't take this the wrong way, but could you... um... sit somewhere that your argument... um... won't...”

Zuko gives Jee a very dark look. He wriggles slightly in his seat, adjusting his position so that he is more comfortable, and then, when Sokka sits next to him, Zuko does not break eye contact with Jee as he says “Sokka, I'm going to talk to your sister eventually. Just let it happen and don't get in my way.”

“Get in your way?” Sokka follows Zuko's eyes. Soon, two burn-scarred faces are glaring at Jee, one of them with curiousity. “Fine, Zuko. Whatever. Make an ass of yourself in front of the Avatar and your soulmate's sister. Whatever. You dipshit. Now why are we mad at Jee?”

Uh oh.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, this chapter is where the Momo With A Knife tag comes in, and, uh, trigger warning for gore. Momo stabs someone, and although I don't go into much detail, it's still pretty grody. To avoid that bit, skip the paragraph that begins with "And then Azula's favorite" and just... move on to the next one.

Zuko has no intention of witnessing anything he wasn't supposed to see. He's not even sure this qualifies, but he hangs back anyway when he spots Suki approaching Sokka just outside the superstructure. Sokka has taken to spending free time there, now that they all have a little bit of free time. Zuko will find him there in the mornings, looking in the general direction of the Earth Kingdom as the sun comes up. He wonders if his soulmate used to get up early, or if the habit is recently acquired from weeks on a ship with firebenders, many of whom take the whole our-lives-are-ruled-by-the-sun thing a little too seriously and actually do wake up at or before sunrise every day.

A part of him wonders if he should intervene. Suki has not been kind to Sokka, and any injury she delivers to him is likely to affect Zuko as well. This seems like a good reason to keep an eye on what's happening. “Sokka, can I talk to you?” she says.

Sokka jumps a little and turns to see her. “Suki!” he squeaks, and it's _definitely not cute._

~~It's cute~~

Suki isn't in her Kyoshi Warrior getup. She usually gets into uniform about an hour after breakfast. Her face is surprisingly open and sweet this way. She has a nervous habit of reaching for a fan, just like Sokka tends to reach for the back of his neck, where his boomerang now hangs, restored to him. They face each other, reaching for weapons neither of them has any intention of using. Sokka, as usual, turns it into a scratch. 

“I um... I wanted to apologize,” Suki says. She looks past Sokka at the slow rise of color in the east. “For how I treated you,” she continues. “You know. When you were my prisoner.”

Zuko stifles a laugh. Gen almost steps out onto the deck past him, but Zuko snaps an arm out to stop the old White Lotus man. When Gen turns an outraged eye on him, Zuko holds a finger to his lips and points at the ongoing conversation.

“It's okay, Suki,” Sokka says. 

She shakes her head. “I treated you like a traitor because of who your soulmate is.”

Sokka grins, and Suki doesn't really know him yet, but Zuko knows that look, and that look means that this conversation has just become a verbal Agni Kai, and Suki should be ready for sparring. “Actually, I was wondering why you were so nice to Iroh,” Sokka says. “It was almost like you had a thing for him.”

Tama and Noka's footsteps herald their arrival. Zuko and Gen both turn to shush them and the Kyoshi Warriors join in to watch as Suki's face goes almost as white as her makeup. Zuko is ready to count that as a score for Sokka. After all, the end of hostilities isn't always smooth. Suki rallies magnificently, though. “Of course I have a thing for him,” she says. Sokka pales slightly, then turns a little green. He is opening his mouth to reply when Suki adds “that thing is mortal terror. Or did you not know that Iroh is also called the Great Dragon of the West? He could kill anyone on this ship whenever he wants, whether they see him coming or not. I wasn't about to get on his bad side.”

Somewhere in the middle of this speech, Uncle arrives, sees what's going on, and stops to watch. Lieutenant Jee isn't far behind him, and Uncle shushes the man before he can speak.

Sokka slowly un-greens. Zuko smiles, and if it's a little vindictive, that's hardly his fault. It's nice to see someone keeping up with Sokka in teasing mode. The only other person who can do it is Uncle, and that's more of a massacre than an even fight. Zuko... doesn't try.

Sokka looks down at the deck under his feet, then back at Suki. “Thanks for the help. With my diet, I mean. I'm not going to eat for a week after you made me picture that. Couldn't you have just told me how he can kill us all? Now I'm gonna have _nightmares.”_

Always so dramatic.

A few more of the Kyoshi warriors arrive. They join the curious onlookers as Suki laughs gently. “You started it.”

Sokka smiles back at her. “I guess I did. Anyways, apology accepted, I guess. I mean, I understood it. I... might have done the same thing in your position.” The sun breaks over the horizon, and the two on the deck, plus the nearly a dozen still lurking just out of sight, take a few moments to watch the sunrise. Sokka is the first to break the silence. “You know, I meant it, when I said you were the prettiest girl I've ever met.”

Judging by her stance and the little grin on Sokka's face, Suki rolls her eyes when she asks “how many girls have you met?”

Sokka looks up at the sky. Zuko knows by now that he is probably tapping his fingers on the gunwale as he adds them up. “Almost a hundred,” he concludes.

Suki's laugh covers a few snorts. 

Zuko will not think about whether his own was one of them. He grips the edge of his shirt to focus on _not laughing._

“Sokka,” Suki says, “you need to meet more girls. And I've met your sister, sweetie. I am not the prettiest girl you ever met, 'cause you've met her.”

Sokka deflates a little. “Man, I can't even argue with that because she's my sister and also you're right. My whole family is like that. Even Gran Gran is pretty!” He leans dejectedly over the side of the ship. “And me! I'm cursed to be the prettiest of us all!”

There are several more soft laughs from what seems to be most of the crew, but again, Suki's laughter covers it. Suki reins in her laughter and replies, “At least you're confident.”

Sokka bumps her shoulder with his own. “That's me. Mister Confidence.”

“Hey, what's the holdup,” a voice questions from the back of the crowd. Eph, one of the Kyoshi Warriors, is poking her head around people to try to get a closer look. Suki and Sokka both whirl around. Zuko presses back into the crowd, trying to get out of sight, but he's too far forward and the crowd is too dense. Sometimes, Zuko wishes the _Snapdragon_ was one of those big huge ships she can run circles around.

Okay, most of the time he wishes that and on rare occasions he is grateful for what he has.

Okay, he has fervently wished that the _Snapdragon_ was a much larger ship for all but about twenty minutes of the time he has spent aboard her.

“Hi Zuko,” Sokka says. “How long have you been there?”

“Um... A moment,” Zuko says.

Sokka looks at Zuko, then at the crowd behind him. Zuko turns to Uncle for supp—Uncle is gone. How does a man who is shaped suspiciously like a large wine keg move through tight spaces so quickly?

Sokka sighs. He pushes past Zuko and the rest of the crew, and Suki follows him.

Perfect.

That was _so_ graceful.

+

The report arrives by messenger-hawk four days before the solstice. The Avatar has been spotted north of Omashu, where he set free a bunch of prisoners from one of the floating camps. Commander Kebab, formerly Commander Zhao, is at least reasonably competent, and he tracks the Avatar carefully. A rumor comes to them, now that they are looking for such a thing, of a village that the Avatar is helping out. They won't be able to reach the place in time to catch him, but Zhao determines that his probable destination is the port of Six Piers Burning. 

Probable, but not certain. The Avatar is generally on course for the grey market town, but Kebab notes that he was helping the village with a _spiritual_ matter, and the Fire Temple is very close by. With how fast a flying bison (and seriously, what? How does the Avatar have a flying fucking bison?) is supposed to be, he could reach it in only a day, and the solstice, by the time they have the rumors, is only a day away, and who knows what sort of spirit stuff he might do in a temple on the solstice.

Azula sends Commander Kebab to Six Piers Burning with a couple of ships and orders to move in and grab the Avatar if they get the chance. She goes to the temple.

+

Sokka's crush has not come back. That would imply that it ever went away, and the fact is that even when Suki was awkwardly avoiding him, he was super into her. He didn't lie when she apologized: he probably would have done the same in her position. It was frustrating, but he was always impressed. And by now, he's glad he never said some of the things he first thought when he met her, because she's right, and he doesn't know enough girls, or he would have never thought there was anything even the least bit unlikely about the Kyoshi Warriors. He has to wonder how many of the girls at home would be incredible warriors if they were allowed it.

But crush or not, he's getting very tired of Suki kicking his ass. Zuko still refuses to spar with him, _you don't even have a sword, Sokka—that's not the point, I have to know how to fight people with swords—well, learn with someone else_ even though he has those really cool curved swords in his cabin. As Suki faces him down with a fan pointed at his face, he sighs, and when the watchman crows out an alert, he's relieved. Work means not getting his ass kicked.

Unless you count Zhao and the mutiny.

The problem is that there's not a lot on the sea that doesn't want to kill them, and there's almost nothing that they'll be able to fight effectively. 

There's smoke on the horizon. It's moving faster than most Fire Nation ships do.

Zuko pokes his head out onto the deck. “Sokka, Suki!”

“We're on our way,” Sokka calls out, and he and Suki both go running to follow Zuko.

When they get to the bridge, Iroh, Jee, and Gen are there too, along with the afternoon shift of the bridge crew. It's kind of nice to have a full crew on the bridge without everyone being exhausted.

“What's the bad news?” Sokka asks.

“The ship is the _Phoenix Flight.”_ The grim tone of Iroh's voice tells Sokka more than the basically meaningless name. 

“How much faster than us are they?” Get information, come up with a plan, get information to knock down that plan, come up with a plan to beat the new stuff, repeat, repeat, repeat. Sokka could do this all day, except there might be a fight today. Unless...

“That's my father's personal courier,” Zuko says. “They'll catch us in a few minutes. And if they've sent that out to catch us, then either my father or my sister is on it.”

“I'm guessing from the look on your face that your sister would be a bad thing,” Sokka says.

“Better than my father, but not much,” Zuko confirms.

Sokka tosses around the idea that is forming in his head. He is fairly sure it will work, but he needs to know something, first. “Can all firebenders do that thing where you turn into a new year rocket?”

Iroh is the first to get it, if his smile is any indication. “It is very simple to accomplish,” he acknowledges.

+

The _Snapdragon_ goes tearing away in front of a plume of fire so big and bright that Azula has to look away. It's a shame, really. She's known from the start that she'd end up terminating her brother's exile, but the cowardice is unexpected.

Of course, Zuzu _has_ spent three years with the man who failed to take Ba Sing Se because he lost the wrong soldier. Maybe cowardice is catching.

Well, no matter. The Avatar is more important right now.

Azula turns back towards the ocean, and the clouds of billowing, reeking smoke all around them as they pass through the _Snapdragon'_ s trail.

+

Shyu is pretty sure he's going to die today. Helping the Avatar may have seemed like a good idea, but now the crown princess is holding him prisoner while the other sages back her up.

There was a time when this would have been unthinkable, but that was centuries ago. With as many slit throats as Fire Nation politics implies, it was only a matter of time.

“I'm sorry, Katara,” the Avatar says, and a gout of flame cuts him off. The critical moment, the moment the Avatar is here for, is fast approaching. The glee in Princess Azula's face is obscene. She wants to torture and kill, Shyu can read it in her eyes.

“I didn't think I'd get the last Southern waterbender, too,” Azula taunts. “There's no use denying it, we know.”

Shyu has never hated the top floor of the temple quite as much as this. That statue of Avatar Roku is creepy, but it has nothing on the raw terror invoked by a visit from royalty.

Suddenly, there is a chittering noise, and from above, a creature drops down onto Azula's head. It's the Avatar's... bat lemur? It claws at the princess's eyes, and she yells, reaches up, and tears it off of her head, holding the squirming animal out at arm's length. “I was wondering who to kill first,” she says, pulling out a knife. “Not anymore.” She brings the knife up to the creature's throat.

“Momo!” the Avatar cries.

Azula smiles viciously. The Avatar closes his eyes, and he turns away, so he doesn't see _something_ smash hard into the back of Azula's head. She drops both the knife and the lemur, and everyone's attention is turned down the corridor to...

Shyu nearly faints.

Prince Zuko, General Iroh, three girls in green, and what appears to be a Water Tribe boy with identical facial scars to the

_Prince Zuko has a_ soulmate? _Prince Zuko's soulmate is a_ Water Tribe warrior?

The Water Tribe Boy's weapon spins back to his hand. He is already running, and the girls in green start running too, and then _the fucking Dragon of the West_ unleashes his signature firebending attack with a roaring exhalation of flames. The warriors are concealed from sight until they burst through into melee range. Prince Zuko slips around the flames just next to them as the sages and the princess turn to meet the threat. Shyu's chains go slack a moment later, and the Avatar slips out of confinement next to him. Before the prince can rejoin the battle, Shyu grabs him by the arm. “How many flames can you produce at once?” he asks.

“Three, if I have to, but it's easier to do two,” the prince replies.

“Help me open this door. You do two, I can do three,” Shyu says. “Strong flames.”

To his credit, the prince seems to know either exactly what's happening, that listening to the Fire Sages is usually a good idea, or some combination of the two. He doesn't hesitate, just bends flames into the door. The Avatar darts through, and then they all join the fight. The Avatar's soulmate bends water into gushes and streams. She's inexperienced, but it seems like she has potential.

+

Okay, yeah, these are definitely the Fire Sages.

Zuko has never been great at blocking the bending of others, and now he is in direct combat with one of the actual, literal Fire Sages. Combat, most likely, to the death. His own death, if this keeps up. He can see Sokka across the melee, keeping to Suki's right side in the hopes that she'll cover his left. Zuko knows that instinct, and he wishes he could get to Sokka so they can cover each other's left and also have Suki fighting with them, because, as Zuko notes while he desperately deflects another bone-melting blast, both Suki and Sokka are absolute murder in a fight. Against anyone but four Fire Sages and Azula, this fight would be over by now. As it is, there are definitely more people coming, and some of Azula's crew arrive even as Zuko thinks it. He can't watch Sokka fight like the ~~magnificent~~ brute he is on the battlefield, because suddenly, surviving against this Fire Sage isn't enough: he has to beat him, and he has to do it on a deadline.

And he's not going to. The Fire Sage readies a blast too quickly, and Zuko can tell that this will be a deathblow. The world seems to slow down. Fire blossoms around the Sage's fingers, and he starts to punch forwards...

And then Azula's favorite dagger plunges into his right eye, put there by... one of the bat-lemurs from the Southern Air Temple. It doesn't drive in deep, the little beast didn't have much strength or any technique. The Sage will survive.

Well, he'll survive the knife wound. Probably. Zuko makes sure he's out of the fight and turns to the next Sage, but the first of Azula's backup is joining the fight, although a flying lemur with a dagger seems to have thrown them all for a loop.

Uncle is dueling two Fire Sages at once, Sokka and Suki are taking on Azula and, judging by the sudden agony of a burn flaring across Zuko's ribs, they're not faring very well. Suki's two underlings are taking on the remaining Sage with Sokka's sister and the Fire Sage who's helping them.

Zuko really, really wants to join in with Sokka, but they'll all die if no one takes on the reinforcements, so he moves that way.

+

At first, Sokka is sure Zuko has decided to switch sides. He sees the intent to help, and then a moment of decision, and he thinks maybe he has the capacity to kill himself in order to stop Zuko, but then, instead of fleeing or turning against them, Zuko is throwing fire at the oncoming soldiers. 

Zuko's younger sister might be a complete terror, but Sokka is deeply, deeply impressed by ~~the figure Zuko cuts when he's fighting~~ Zuko's skills, as well. 

There is little time to be impressed, though. Sokka ducks under Suki's right arm and follows up her fan-feint with a very real blow, and finally, finally, _finally_ something connects. Sokka almost squeals in delight when the princess clutches her side. Blood seeps into her clothes before she takes her hand away. Sokka's war club left that mark. He slips back around Suki's other side and spins to check behind them. The flying monkey that Azula almost killed zips by overhead and stabs with a stolen knife at the top of a Fire Nation soldier's head. Sokka throws his boomerang into the approaching forces and slips back under Suki's right arm to make another swing for the princess. This one, she catches with an extended hand, and Sokka lets her hold it, leans back, and scootches Suki aside while he counts seconds.

He smiles at her and leans his head to the right, just in time. His boomerang whips past him and clocks Azula in the forehead. She reels backward, and Sokka swings his club low, going for the knee.

She screams as it connects with a sharp crack.

Sokka turns to the two Fire Sages Iroh is fighting. Suki turns with him, and then screaming pain erupts across Sokka's back. He drops, and he rolls, and he sees the tableau spread in front of him.

Azula has her hands up, projecting flames now at Suki. Zuko has collapsed with the same pain as Sokka. Katara is desperately bending at the oncoming soldiers, but it's hopeless. There's no winning this fight.

A fireball slams through the nearest window. Everything goes silent for a moment, and then the next part of their plan goes off.

It was simple enough: the four firebenders besides Iroh and Zuko turned the _Snapdragon_ into the fastest thing on the sea by playing rocket while Iroh, Zuko, Sokka, Suki, and two Kyoshi Warriors hung back in little kayaks to latch onto the _Phoenix Flight_ 's hull. If Azula didn't go to Crescent Island, then they could just detach and wait for the _Snapdragon_ to pick them up. Otherwise, the _Snapdragon_ would come to a quasi-hidden cove, and Jee would take the remaining fighting-fit crew and raid the temple because Azula going to the temple would almost certainly mean the Avatar going to the temple and would almost certainly mean a pitched battle that couldn't be won fairly.

Not that this is a guaranteed win. There were only six kayaks, and Sokka is really starting to wish they'd gotten more, because it might be too late. They might lose someone. 

And then the door opens up. Everyone turns to see Aang, who, combined with the _Snapdragon_ crew coming in, might actually save a few lives. But it's not Aang. Or at least, it's mostly not Aang. In the form of the old man in the door, there are echoes and hints of Aang, none of them visible, but all of them unmistakable. 

His eyes are glowing. He lifts up a hand, and the whole island comes alive. 

Sokka has, until now, been fairly sure of the limits of bending. He is not prepared for the magnitude of what not-exactly-not-Aang accomplishes. The fight is over in seconds. Azula lurches upright and limps away, flames and earthquakes and streams of air rush around, and they all flee. There are rumbles and explosions. 

The old man fades away, leaving Aang, exhausted, in his place. Sokka forces himself to his feet and catches the Avatar before he can fall. 

They flee. 

Azula's ship has been hit by falling lava. Nice bending, not-quite-not-Aang. They make it to the _Snapdragon_ without anyone else popping out to murder them, although Sokka is pretty sure Azula sees them going. Aang's giant furry flying monster is parked in a spot Katara knows, and they retrieve him in short order, but Sokka stops paying attention even as they push off from the shore. The pain on his back is horrific, and it's scrambling his brain, and he's pretty good at working through this kind of thing because with Zuko as a soulmate, he's had to be, but he wishes he was as good at it as Zuko. 

He only lets himself pass out when he's sure they're safe for the moment. 

He really hopes nobody minds him doing that on the bridge. Zuko probably won't: they pass out at the same time. 


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warning: Jet

The wound is one of the most frightening things Aang has ever seen. Katara pulls water to her hands, and Aang knows she can do this, of course, but he's only seen it work with little things, nicks and cuts. This is a broad burn across Sokka's back, red and charred. 

Katara starts by washing the wound clean with a rush of water. Sokka twitches, but doesn't wake up. Aang frowns over at Zuko and hurries to clean out his wound. If the remains of his shirt stay in that mess, it'll just hurt them both. Zuko twitches, too, but he also wakes up, glaring blearily at Aang. 

“Fucking...” he growls in a hoarse voice. His eyes focus a little. “Avatar?” he manages, and then he gasps.

The wound on Zuko's back begins to heal, the red skin soothing away. Some places don't heal. The skin there puckers and pales. Aang does his best to clean these places as they appear, and Zuko groans and sobs and makes about a zillion other noises that aren't overly prince-ish.

He threw fire at Katara. He's going to get teased for some of these sounds. Aang has doubts about the ethics of that, but it's going to happen anyway.

Slowly, the sounds fade, and Zuko sits up. Aang circles behind him to watch it close up the rest of the way. Katara keeps going. She looks up at Zuko. “Tell me when it stops hurting.”

Zuko nods. The wound turns pink and smooth, then slowly begins to fade. Katara is clearly getting tired, and even before Aang thinks to say anything, because he has seen her tired and frustrated and even happy a couple of times, Zuko says “It still hurts, but mostly on the surface. We're out of danger. You should stop before you wear yourself out.”

Katara shakes her head. “No, I can fix this all the way.”

Aang has doubts about that. She's tiring faster now, and the damage that remains isn't threatening, but it is _extensive,_ and healing it all will take a long time and a lot of care.

Zuko takes a deep breath. “You can come back to it. We'll hurt, but we've done that plenty on this trip. We'll do a lot better if you don't collapse trying to help us.” He looks down at Sokka, and there's a sort of exasperated fondness there that Aang doubts if even the firebender has noticed yet. “Besides, if the way he talks about you means anything, he'd agree with me. Apparently siblings are supposed to love each other?”

“Ideally,” Sokka says into the cushion he is laying on. “Katara, don't wipe yourself out. It's okay.” Katara finally backs away. “I'm very lightheaded and my back hurts, so I'm not sitting up,” Sokka says. “This isn't the bridge, where are we?”

“Zuko's cabin,” Katara says. “It was the only place with enough room for both of you.”

“A nice old man helped us here after he told us the infirmary was full," Aang adds.

“Okay,” Sokka says. He waggles his hands around. “Um, Katara and Aang, this is Zuko. He's my soulmate, and he's a complete asshole. Zuko, the one with hair is my sister Katara. She can kick your ass. The one without hair is the Avatar, Aang. He can probably kick your ass.”

Aang shrugs. There is no point in false humility. “I mean, I probably can,” he confirms. “And Katara definitely can.”

“Then you have something in common with half my crew,” Zuko says.

Sokka laughs. “Zuko! Zuko was that a joke? Did you make a joke?”

“No, Sokka, the Kyoshi Warriors are some of the world's most renowned fighters. They don't train benders because they're afraid that would make them too powerful. Suki and most of her minions could absolutely kill me if they had to. Why do you think they're here?”

This conversation is fascinating. Aang joins in with “it's kind of funny that the Kyoshi Warriors don't train benders so that the benders won't get too powerful, since Avatar Kyoshi was supposed to have been really fierce.”

“Uncle calls it the Great Irony of Kyoshi,” Zuko replies, and then turns faintly green when he looks at Aang. He's probably having trouble adjusting to all this ~~instead of not thinking about it until he can have a quiet panic attack later.~~

Aang is about to say something comforting when Suki bursts into the room. There are bandages scattered around her body, including one on her forehead. “Sokka!” she exclaims. “I heard you collapsed!” Her tone is terrified, and also sort of scolding. This, Aang notes, is the same tone Katara uses when she thinks he is doing something stupid. He wonders if it's something girls just... do.

“I'm fine,” Sokka says. “Really.”

“He knows better than to turn his back on my crazy evil sister now, though,” Zuko says.

“Wait,” Suki says, “that was actually your sister? I thought she'd just looked at a lineup of mercenaries and picked the one that looked most unhinged. You're telling me you're actually related to that murder-child?”

Zuko nods. 

“That explains many of your quirks and also why you think it's brave for me to tease my sister,” Sokka says.

“Your sister tried to hurt Momo,” Aang says. Momo chitters angrily from the corner where he's taken over Zuko's desk.

“I'm sorry,” Zuko says, but Aang cuts him off before he can get going.

“Has she always been mean to animals?”

Zuko frowns. “Um. Yeah.”

“That makes sense,” Sokka, Katara, Suki, and Aang all say at once.

+

Hakoda's ears perk up at the mention of a prince. In these sorts of bars, in this part of the Colonies, it's easy enough to muscle in on a conversation, and he does so with a cheerfully slurred “wait, say that again about the prince!” He scoots his chair closer with just enough gracelessness to convince the gossipers that he is as drunk as he sounds. “What prince?”

One of the gossipers, a sour-faced woman wearing a cloak that is stiff with hidden knives, scoffs at him. “Prince Zuko of the Fire Nation. The Banished Prince. He went nuts a few weeks ago down south, stabbed that asshole Zhao. Apparently, he sank the Fire Lord's personal courier and then attacked Six Piers Burning.”

“That's nothing,” says a young man wearing the secret insignia of an earthbender for hire, “I heard when he attacked the Fire Lord's courier, he was with the Avatar.” That's not exactly a new one. Every misfortune that befalls a Fire Navy ship gets blamed on the Avatar by someone.

“Ha. You both know nothing,” says an ambiguous shape in a dark brown cloak. “I met a deserter from his ship! He's not working with the Avatar, he's chasing him! He went nuts all right, though. It's his crazy uncle. They found some boy with burns like he's got and Iroh decided that was the prince's soulmate.”

Hakoda blinks. Burns... soulmates... He almost forgets to slur his words as he says “What kinda burns has the prince got?”

The stranger in the cloak gestures to their face, which remains well-hidden. “A great big burn on his left side, and a bunch of patchy burns on his right. They say it's from an Agni Kai with his own father.”

Hakoda's blood turns to glacier-melt in his veins. He wants to send a message to every one of his contacts. He wants to chase down this prince and get back his son, but he can't because if this is true, that's his son's _soulmate,_ and the elders would never forgive him.

_Destiny must be fulfilled, Hakoda._

Well, maybe he can check in on these rumors.

He pumps the gossipers for information for an hour more, then leaves as they're beginning to get annoyed. He finds Bato out on the docks, and he taps the man's shoulder. “Bato, let's get on the ship. I have to talk to you, and you might freak out.”

Bato freaks out _completely._ He waits for Hakoda to finish telling him that Sokka is traveling in the company of the banished prince of the Fire Nation, the Dragon of the West, and a shipful of Fire Nation mutineers, following rumors of a child Avatar who may or may not be traveling with _Katara,_ and getting into repeated battles with the Fire Navy and possibly also other members of the royal family. When Hakoda signals that he is done telling his story, Bato jumps up from where he's been sitting on Hakoda's cot. And he freaks _completely_ out.

“His _soulmate_ is the _Fire Prince?_ Hakoda, that's impossible. You and I both know there's no way your son would betray the Water Tribe like that!” Bato throws his arms out wide. “It's a coincidence, Hakoda. It probably isn't even Sokka!” Bato paces a little, then says, “And he's supposed to stay in the village to protect Katara. I mean, if Katara left with some boy... but the Avatar?” Bato leans against the wall. He looks down at the ground, pensive. “I mean, it would explain a lot about her... her scars. But there's no way.” Bato paces in silence, then starts sorting through Hakoda's maps. “Where is Six Piers Burning, anyway? There! What were they doing there? That's a black market town.” Bato turns towards Hakoda. “I think they're going north. We might be able to catch them if we raid near the Bay of Weeping Mothers.”

Hakoda grins. “Let's go.”

+

Appa can fly.

This isn't exactly a surprise to Zuko, but he didn't expect what it would be like to be _on_ Appa when he's flying. For one thing, no matter how good Appa, or possibly Aang, might be at bending the air to form their own little micro-climate, it's still cold and windy, just not as much as it should be.

There's also the height.

Zuko doesn't like the height. Sokka seems to think the whole thing is just a fun adventure, as though there isn't a FOUR MILE DROP under them. He will not admit out loud that Aang and Appa can probably catch him if he falls. 

These little airborne excursions are Uncle's idea. After the (almost) unmitigated disaster of Six Piers Burning, Uncle has decided that they should take advantage of Appa's speed to get supplies from deep inland, and also practice finding the _Snapdragon_ after leaving it behind for a while. Of course, Uncle isn't here, because _”My old bones can't take flying too much”_ as though he didn't fight off two fire sages a week and a half ago.

Either way, when they touch down for the night about four hours away from what the map claims is a town, Zuko is more than happy to breathe a little life into the fire and be on a surface that isn't warm, fuzzy, and _flying._

It's just the four of them, Zuko, Sokka, Aang, and Katara. Well, and Appa and the knife-monkey. Uncle likes the knife-monkey. Zuko would take this as a personal affront, but Momo is genuinely nice, even if he is also very much a knife-monkey. He's cute in the same way as a porcupine-snake.

He also makes a surprisingly good watch... critter.

From the way that Momo is alert and watchful all night, Zuko knows there is someone nearby , and he is not at all surprised when they come across the Fire Army camp only an hour into their travels the next day. When the others jump, Zuko just sighs. 

“Fire Nation!” Sokka exclaims intelligently.

“Prince Zuko!” one of the soldiers yells.

Zuko doesn't yell anything. He just starts throwing fire.

The fight is chaotic in the extreme. It doesn't have the same frightening urgency as Crescent Island, because this is ten soldiers, not an exclusive group of elite firebenders and Zuko's terrifying sister (who has somehow managed to get scarier and less stable since he last saw her), but it's still a hard fight, and when arrows start coming out of nowhere and a ~~very cool~~ guy with a pair of shuang gou swords goes rushing in, it only gets worse. The addition of a bushy-haired kid with red cheek tattoos and too many swords follows, then there's a huge guy with a small child riding around on his shoulder, and yeah, so it wasn't an even fight to begin with, but this is just ridiculous. They take down the camp, and some noises in the distance tell Zuko there won't be any survivors, and then shuang gou boy is turning on _Zuko._

Zuko yelps, and this guy definitely has experience fighting firebenders, because he isn't giving an inch, so Zuko reaches back, grabs his dao, and starts pushing back.

Everyone is watching, momentarily stunned by the turn of events. Zuko isn't sure why they should be. This is how bandits operate, or part of it, at least.

Shuang gou boy is good, but he doesn't have Zuko's experience, and Zuko doesn't hesitate to add fire to his moves, enough to throw the guy back and leave him flat on the ground. Zuko freezes, with one blade at the guy's throat and one blade ready to guard against attacks.

“I'm not going to hurt you if I don't have to, but don't push me,” Zuko says.

“Leave him alone!” Sokka adds, yelling to the kid trying to wield three swords at once.

“He's a firebender,” Shuang Gou Boy retorts.

“Wow, racist,” Sokka and Zuko say at the same time. Zuko cringes a little.

“In case you didn't notice, I kicked more Fire Nation ass in that fight than you did,” Zuko says, if only to distinguish himself from Sokka.

“Jet,” the kid riding around on Big Guy says, “he's not lying. He fought those soldiers. And look at his face.”

A tall, reedy guy with a wide, shallow hat emerges from the trees and looks at Three Swords, who nods sagely and replies(?), “Yeah, you're right, Longshot. Look at the other one's face, too.”

“Same scars,” Big Guy adds, “just like you and that girl from a couple of years ago.”

“Jet” drops his swords. Zuko slowly relaxes. Everyone else slowly relaxes with him.

Finally, Jet speaks. “Um. I'm sorry. I got a little carried away, I guess. I'm Jet.” He stands up. He's about Zuko's height, with tanned skin and ~~attractively~~ shaggy brown hair, his slim, strong frame festooned with asymmetrical shoulder armor and an outfit that speaks of some ability to appreciate the color red, which is nice. It's too bad about the attempted murder, really. Jet gestures to his companions. “These are my Freedom Fighters.” He points at each in turn: Too Many swords “Smellerbee,” Silent Bow Guy “Longshot,” Big Guy “Pipsqueak,” and Worryingly Small Child With A Knife Participating In An Actual Fucking War What The Evershitting Fuck Jet? “The Duke.” 

The Duke is opening a barrel, and he exclaims “I found jelly candy!” just as Pipsqueak says “I found blasting jelly!”

Jet blinks, looking around to size up their little gang. Zuko feels distinctly unimpressive for a moment.

And then Sokka says “You probably don't want to get those mixed up,” and Aang cracks up first, but there's so much tension in the air that the ridiculousness of it all pushes Zuko right over the edge, and just after he starts laughing, Jet joins in, ~~and holy shit he has an amazing laugh,~~ and that sets off Sokka and The Duke, who sets off Pipsqueak, who sets off Katara, and pretty soon it's Longshot and Smellerbee standing silent in a clearing with seven cackling idiots and a knife-monkey.

It's surprisingly pleasant.

Also, Zuko is beginning to worry. This Jet guy may be trouble.

+

Okay, so this Jet guy may be the coolest person Katara has ever met. Yeah, Aang is the Avatar, and yeah, she loves Aang (wait, she does? Huh. That deserves further thought), and yeah, Zuko is also staggeringly cool for someone with all the social graces of a seal-leopard who tried to kill her when they first met (she is feeling fairly favorable to him after what he went through for her sake at Six Piers Burning), but Jet is on a whole other level, and those swords are unreal levels of cool.

Even if Zuko did kick his ass, for which Katara is grateful, because if Zuko got hurt, her brother would get hurt, too.

And what he's doing... it _matters,_ it's a real fight against the Fire Nation. So yeah, she has a bit of a crush. Sokka is going to tease her about it, and Aang might, too. Zuko won't. Largely because he also has a super-obvious crush on Jet.

Weirdly, Jet seems to be kind of into it. 

Okay, it's not totally weird, because Katara gets it a little, about Zuko. If he didn't have her brother's scars across his face, marking him as family, she'd probably have kind of a thing about him, the way she's seen a couple of girls in Earth Kingdom towns do. But she's not jealous, if only because Jet has spent his time flirting with her, too.

He has a whole community set up in the treetops, and there are people here, kids, that he's protecting, and he gave this whole speech at dinner, and yeah, they're totally going to stay and help Jet, even if it does add a little time to their trip. 

“We'd love to help you,” Katara tells him when he asks. 

When she and Zuko come to the little hut they're all sharing, Sokka says “so are we staying for breakfast, or does he need us to leave before then?”

“We're staying to help out for a day or two,” Katara replies.

“Oh no we're not,” Sokka says. Aang get a nervous look in his eyes and starts edging away from the confrontation. “Katara, I do not trust this guy. He attacked Zuko just because he's a firebender, and he didn't exactly seem to think that was a bad thing.”

“That was just a misunderstanding,” Katara says. She frowns. The criticism leaves a bad taste in her mouth, as though it is directed at her.

“I'm sure it was a misunderstanding,” Zuko says. “He must have seen me bending and not seen who I was bending at. He came in pretty fast, after all.”

“You or me might miss that, buddy, but not someone with two good eyes,” Sokka says. “Right, Aang?”

Aang stares at Sokka like he's afraid to answer, which Katara supposes he might be. Aang gets a little freaked out by conflict sometimes, which Sokka says is not a great quality in an Avatar.

“That's not the point,” Katara snaps. “The point is that he's doing good here and we should help him.”

“I think you mean the point is that you have a crush on him almost as big as Zuko's and you want to spend more time around him.”

“Hey!” Zuko yells.

“Zuko, buddy, it's really obvious. Don't worry, it's cute.”

“I am _not_ cute,” Zuko objects.

“You're kinda cute,” Aang says.

Katara nods solemnly. “If you'd do something about your hair, you'd be full-on cute instead of edgy cute.”

“My hair is fine,” Zuko grumbles. “It's a traditional style, and it's not like I'll look good with any other style.” he gestures to his scars.

“Oh, so I should switch to that style?” Sokka says.

Zuko blinks. He stares at Sokka. “What? No, your hair is fine the way it is.”

“Then why can't you pull off this style? Or any style you want?”

Zuko purses his lips, eyes downcast. He slips out of the hut.

“We're staying to help for a while,” Katara says.

Sokka sighs.

+

Jet is... a little disappointed when he catches the firebender out and about with a knife. He's about to confront him when the guy sits down on the edge of a platform and starts playing with his hair. This is... not expected.

Jet could push him off the platform, but there might be some advantage in keeping him around. After all, it sounded like one of those soldiers they got rid of today had called him “Prince Zuko.” And even if that turns out to be nothing, Zuko is good in a fight, and might make a useful spy, and Jet is pretty sure he could ensure Zuko's loyalty with a wink and a flirt.

He kinda wants to, actually, and maybe Katara's too.

Fuck, while he's at it, Sokka's pretty attractive, too. Angry, but in a hot way.

Basically, they might all make great Freedom Fighters. But the Avatar and Katara? Oh, now there's a good pair for right now. That said, it doesn't hurt to take the opportunities he can. He steps up and sits next to Zuko. Zuko jumps as he sits, and Jet's right arm settles on his shoulder as Zuko turns to look at him. “It's okay,” he says, as soothing as he can, and squeezes Zuko's shoulder gently. He lets his hand drift down Zuko's back, dropping down behind him, close enough to Zuko's ass that he can probably sense the heat of Jet's body or whatever. “It's just me.”

“Sorry,” Zuko says. “I can barely see out of my left eye. You startled me a little.”

“It's fine,” Jet says, and he makes sure to take note of it. That might help with Sokka, too. Speaking of which... “Do you know why you and Sokka have the same scars? Because I've looked, and they're exactly the same.”

Zuko blinks. “I... he's my soulmate. Aang and Katara have the same scars, too. It's how you can tell. When you have a soulmate, you share most of your injuries. Anything that scars, inside or out.”

Jet thinks of a girl with thick black hair piled high on her head, too young when they met ~~but Jet has always been too young for everything and people grow up anyway,~~ and that one scar on his ankle from when The Duke cut her, and the burn on his finger from when she touched the boiling kettle when she was three, and how many of his hurts she had across her body, and how very many of hers he holds, and not talking about it because she had to go and he had to stay and _who was this girl to go wandering away from her parents even though she was_

“I didn't know there was such a thing,” Jet says ~~because he has to say something.~~

A comical grimace crosses Zuko's face. “I couldn't believe it when I met him. I mean, I thought it was going to be a girl, for one thing. Uncle used to tell me about famous soulmates, and it was always a boy and a girl, except for that one about a group of five friends who were soulmates and went on a quest to return bending to the lion-turtles.” Zuko's grimace turns to a soft smile. Okay, Jet is not immune to this guy. He'll have to warn Smellerbee. “But since then, I guess I've come to like him,” Zuko says. “Sokka is a loud, annoying weirdo who doesn't take anything seriously, but he's also... pretty smart. And he's kind, which is important. I guess.” Jet opens his mouth to reply, but Zuko adds “he's also pretty mean in a fight, but you can't tell him I said that. He fights dirty, and it works. Most people think they're too good to fight dirty, like every fight is an Agni Kai. It's not.” Jet waits a few moments. Sure enough, Zuko goes on, “He's really determined, too. Loyal, adaptable, a way better talker than me.” He shrugs. “Kind of insensitive sometimes, though.” he looks at his hair.

Jet sighs. This... might complicate things. Still, it's worth trying.

“Sounds like you really love him,” Jet says.

Zuko turns bright red, which is pretty funny with that huge scar and his mostly-bald head. “What? No, we're not... I mean, I respect him, and I might call him a friend, but he's not... and we don't... I don't think he even likes... You know?” 

Oh. Zuko is looking at him with his good eye all wide and earnest, and Jet smiles. “Oh yeah?” he says as though there was a complete sentence somewhere in what just came out of Zuko's mouth. Zuko nods. “Well, he's not all smart, then, because if I had a soulmate like you...” Zuko turns even redder. This is easy, and Jet is enjoying it quite a bit, and there's a part of him that wants to make a move right now, but he should take it just a little slower. “Anyway, why are you out here so late?”

Zuko goes quiet and withdrawn. “I'm thinking about cutting my hair. Changing my style.”

“Going to be bald like Aang?”

Zuko shakes his head. “No. I think I'll grow it out. Long.”

“But the ponytail needs to go first?”

Zuko nods. 

“Can I help?” Jet asks. If he just really wants to touch Zuko, that's for him to know. 

Zuko squeezes his eyes shut. Jet could sweep him right off the walkway. So much trust.

“Do it,” Zuko says.

Jet gets up. He takes the knife, and he has some water in his flask, so he soaks down Zuko's hair, and he's very careful about cutting it, getting it close to the root, and yeah, this knife is sharp enough that he's able to put a decent shave on Zuko's head. It's probably his regular shaving knife.

He sets the ponytail aside, and Zuko picks up the hair. He starts absently braiding it as Jet works.

Zuko's blush is bright and warm against Jet's fingers. He has to resist the urge to caress, to touch. He kneels behind Zuko, concentrating on the way Zuko responds, and letting himself enjoy it. He leans against Zuko slightly, just enough for their bodies to touch, for Zuko's head to lean back against him. The torchlight of their hideout is muted, but steady. Jet drops to a squat to get the last details, and when he hands the knife back to Zuko, their fingers touch.

Jet wraps his hand around Zuko's. His heart is definitely going a little faster. It would be really cool if this one thing could work out.

Zuko twists around to face him, and Jet closes the last little distance between them. The kiss is sweet and slow, while their hands slide up to pull each other close. When they come apart, Zuko rests his forehead against Jet's. “I've never done that before,” he whispers.

Jet kisses him again. “Sounds like you might need practice.”


	9. Chapter 9

So, the thing is that Aang doesn't usually notice _guys_ the same way he notices non-guys. Not that he doesn't notice guys, after all, a week of being on Zuko's ship all the time has made him very aware of the fact that both Sokka and Zuko are _very good looking_ and also Lieutenant Jee in a very different way, but also every last one of the Kyoshi Warriors, and he's only ever met three people who weren't guys or girls, but he really liked all three of them _a lot_ so it's probably that he's just less interested in boys, which is perfectly okay because Monk Gyatso always told him that he should be true to his heart but anyways Jet is definitely on the list of boys that Aang _notices_ because he might be a little violent, but he's also _extremely cool and good looking_ and has spent the last few minutes reassuring Aang that he'll be useful, even vital to freeing this whole valley, and so Aang might be a little excited.

“I'll talk to you guys after we get back and we'll get you to work, okay?” Jet says, and Aang nods. Jet heads off to go patrol their little territory, bringing a whole collection of Fighters, and also Sokka, who seems to be less paranoid now that he's being included. Aang can't really blame him. The whole Zuko thing has probably made him really wary of justifiably broody attractive people.

Aang and Katara spend some time hanging out, but also, Zuko seems to have shaved his head overnight, and Katara is really distracted by Jet right now, so Aang goes to talk to Zuko, who he really hasn't gotten much chance to talk to, what with him spending three days in the infirmary with the aftereffects of the _really cool, extremely dangerous_ stuff he did at Six Piers Burning, especially that bit with the waterfall and the lizard-parrot.

“Hey,” Aang says, sitting next to Zuko when he finds him hanging out on the edge of one of the walkways. 

Zuko turns bright red. “Hi.”

“So do you want meditation sessions in the mornings, or later in the day?” Aang asks. He knows the answer is “neither,” but the look of bafflement of Zuko's face is pretty fun. “You shaved your head,” Aang says. “I'll be honored to welcome you to the Air Nomads.”

Zuko goes from bright red to an even paler color than he usually is. It makes his scars stand out more. Katara thinks Zuko is hot-attractive, but Aang disagrees. Zuko is cute. ~~Sometimes, Aang worries that history will remember him as a frivolous, childish Avatar who was more concerned with crushes and fun than with ending the war that killed~~

Zuko shakes his head. “I just needed to get rid of my ponytail so I could grow my hair out properly,” he says. He looks around. “Actually, can I ask you about something?”

Aang's feet swing over the distant forest floor. “Sure.”

“Are you in love with Katara?”

Aang blinks. Is that all?

Okay, so he loves her, obviously, like, he loves Katara, and Zuko, and Sokka, and Suki, and Uncle Iroh, and Appa and Momo. Aang doesn't know if he's ever been “in love” before, but he definitely feels different about Katara than anyone else on that list. He thinks she's beautiful, and she makes him want to hug and snuggle and hold her and maybe even kiss her and if he wasn't, y'know, _twelve,_ he might want other things with her, too. He kind of feels shadows and glimmers of that with Suki, and a little tiny bit with Sokka. But in love? 

“I don't think so,” Aang says. “I mean I love her, but I love you, too. I love a lot of stuff.” He bends wind at a hanging vine to watch it sway. “But I don't love her the same way as I love you. Like, you're a trustworthy, kinda cool-crazy friend, and you're kinda pretty when you train shirtless, but she's... like... the prettiest girl I ever met, and sweet, and tough, and really really kind, and I kinda want to be around her most of the time, and I wish I could be her... um... boyfriend.” He blushes hard, and he knows it. The top of his head is probably a little red. “I don't have the wanna-be-your-boyfriend thing with you. Why, do you have that with Sokka?”

Zuko blushes, and he looks down at the ground and mumbles “No.” He fidgets and wiggles, and Aang wraps an arm around him and pats gently at his side. Zuko moves his hand slightly, absently. He doesn't start touches very often, but Zuko definitely knows what he wants out of them. He sets a pace for Aang to pat him, and finally breathes, slowly, in and out. “I kissed Jet last night,” Zuko admits. “Kind of a lot. And I'm not sure if I should feel bad about that.”

Aang blinks. He manages not to ask how it was, or do anything else embarrassing. Well, okay, so he says “oh, okay, neat,” which is maybe? A little embarrassing? But he immediately follows it up with “I mean, Jet seems pretty cool. I mean... I'm happy for you.”

“You are?” Zuko says.

Aang nods. “Love is always good,” he says. “Even if it can only last a while, or it ends badly, love is always good. That's what makes it love.”

When Jet and his Freedom Fighters return, Sokka is behind them, looking thunderous. As soon as they're all in the hut, he basically explodes.

+

“I'm going to head out with Sokka for a while,” Zuko says to a smiling Jet, as though Jet hasn't just attacked an innocent man and tried to justify it with weak lies. Even if that was his knife, a knife doesn't prove anything. 

Jet mumbles something too low for Sokka to hear, and Zuko turns bright red. When Jet kisses Zuko, right out in front of everybody, something in Sokka's stomach tries to climb out of his nose. He knows what Jet is, he's seen him playing everyone, because he's not immune to it, but that just means he has to watch out more carefully. He isn't surprised Jet made a move, and he isn't surprised that it worked, ~~but the fact that it's _Zuko_ kinda hurts.~~

Zuko drags him away from the hideout, and Sokka knows it's to get him away from Jet.

“You and Jet, huh?” Sokka says once they're away from the hideout, because maybe he wants to make Zuko uncomfortable.

Zuko nods. “He started it,” he says.

Something tells Sokka that's only about half true. “Jet is trouble, Zuko,” Sokka says. Zuko doesn't say anything. Sokka looks at the trees around them for a while as they walk. When Sokka can no longer stay silent, he says “what did he have to say about thinking you were an enemy because you're a firebender?”

“Nothing,” Zuko says, and he's quiet again.

They end up making their way to the village from the maps. It's a long walk, but they need to go soon, in order to leave an inland trail for Zhao and Azula to follow. The little town is walled, and sort of idyllic and sweet. The shopping is accomplished fairly quickly. However much he might disagree with Zuko's taste in men, they're still soulmates, and they make a pretty good team

Sokka is so invested in comparing smoked meats that he barely notices the boom. Everyone notices the rumble, though. Sokka bolts towards the gate in the big wall closest to the rumble, and Zuko stops short.

There is a wall of water bearing down on them, and no way to escape in time. They are going to die.

Sokka really, sincerely wishes Zuko was a waterbender.

Zuko steps out in front of Sokka, and Sokka appreciates the gesture, he really does, but he's definitely going to die disappointed.

As the water approaches, Sokka wills Zuko to... something. Not die, probably.

Zuko drops into a bending stance, and Sokka watches as he breathes. After a moment, Zuko _roars,_ and a column of flame rushes forward away from him. The flames bite into the approaching flood, flashing it to steam, but it means next to nothing. Sokka drops a hand onto Zuko's back. Something passes between them. Sokka is sure that if anything can save him, it's Zuko.

And then he _does_ it. Zuko bends again, but there is no flame. He stomps and roars and punches, and the fire doesn't come. The onrushing water twitches, though, and Zuko cries out and flings out his arms, and he's _waterbending,_ holding back a flood against the village gate.

Sokka stares at Zuko in bewilderment. He's barely broken his stride, he moves now in clumsy imitation of Katara's waterbending, and the water splashes, but it stays back, long enough for everyone to climb up onto rooftops.

Zuko is in water up to his knees when he loses his grip on the wave, and Sokka barely manages to catch him and haul him up to relative safety.

The town is crumbling by the time Aang and Katara find them from Appa. They look heartbroken. “Jet's plan?” Sokka guesses.

Zuko flinches.

“Yeah,” Aang says.

Once the whole population of the town is safe, Sokka finds Zuko. He grabs him by the elbow.

“I know, I was stupid,” Zuko says.

“No,” Sokka replies, “you got suckered. Because that's what Jet does. It's who he is. I get it. I wish I'd been wrong. It looked like you really liked him.” He shrugs. “That's not what this is about, though. Zuko, you were waterbending.”

Zuko nods. 

“Also, you totally saved my life.”

Zuko nods. There is a smug little smile this time. Sokka hugs him, tightly, a reassuring, warm pressure against his front. Zuko splutters. “I like this a lot better than getting into fistfights with you,” Sokka says.

Zuko returns the embrace. “Me too. Hey Sokka?”

“What?” Sokka asks. He's not sure what he expects Zuko to say next.

But it's not what he actually says, which is “we should get you a sword so you and I can spar.”

Somehow, this is the best thing Zuko could have said. Sokka leans back and glances for the briefest moment at his eyes. One bright and wide and golden, the other pinched and dry and hurting.

~~Sokka really wants to~~ kiss ~~him.~~

Sokka covers up the awkward moment with a joke. “No fistfights when we can slash each other to ribbons instead?”

Zuko smiles, and he _bent water_ for Sokka, and maybe that means something, but they'll have to figure it out for themselves.

+

The tale the children tell is extraordinary. This rebel, Jet, sounds like an interesting young man, and Iroh is not surprised that his nephew would fall for someone like him. Unfortunately, with the experience of his years behind him, Iroh is also not surprised that the young man would attempt an indiscriminate mass murder. It is only luck that Sokka and Zuko were in the town to save everyone, luck that there was only one gate, luck that the water wasn't deeper.

And then there's the waterbending.

Iroh knows a great deal about soulmates and a great deal about bending, but his grandfather and then his father spent an inordinate amount of time and effort to erase any information about soulmates, and besides, the Air Nomads were the acknowledged worldwide experts on the subject. That's a resource they're not going to get back.

Iroh has tried to pass what he knows about the Air Nomads on to Aang, but the young Avatar already knows most of it. Twice, he has left in tears at the idea that anything he does not know is lost forever.

So, Iroh gives them the best advice he can: the name of someone who might know more.

“Wu, of Makapu Village, is an expert on spirits and destiny. Her knowledge is said to be so great that she can accurately predict the future. We will go to her. The journey will take a week, including time spent on Appa.”

Zuko gives him a pleading look. “You'll go with us this time, right Uncle?”

What he means is _“Please don't leave me alone with them again,”_ but he is far too polite to say it. Iroh smiles. “I have things to ask her,” he says. He grins. “Also, I hear that Wu is a very attractive woman, and I would like to meet her.”

Zuko smacks his forehead gently. Iroh's work is done for the day.

When the next morning comes, and everyone is comfortable and rested, Iroh goes about his new normal morning routine: a cup of tea, as always, then a short trip out to the deck. Today, Sokka and Suki are sparring, although he has seen them in states from sparring to taking breakfast in open air to one time when he was half-convinced they had nearly kissed. Zuko is up as well, training against Lee (the older one, who can firebend). Iroh sits with Appa, feeding him the head of cabbage he brought from below deck. Appa makes an agreeable morning companion, and in weather such as this—sultry, his old firebending teacher would have called it, but Iroh calls it overwarm and humid—the sky bison is a little melted around the edges. When Iroh tells him so, Appa groans in what Iroh will assume for the sake of conversation is agreement. 

When the sun is an hour or so into the sky, Katara emerges onto the deck. She looks sleep-rumpled, and she yawns wide, stretching her arms up and out to the sides. She paces over to Iroh, and he smiles as she sits. Katara doesn't usually come to him for advice.

“There will be a storm soon,” Iroh says. Katara nods. “I suspect it will be dangerous to be on deck. Will Appa be all right below deck?”

“I don't know,” Katara says. “You'll have to talk to Aang about that.”

Iroh nods. 

“Do you think Zuko was stupid to fall for Jet's... thing?” Katara asks.

Ah. That explains it.

“My nephew is many things, but stupid is not one of them. Sometimes, he will act before he thinks, and he can be very stubborn. He is also royalty, and that means that he grew up sheltered. The last few years have taken care of a lot of that, but he has never even seen a healthy romance, let alone been part of one. Most people do not have an easy time with their first love. It is very sad that Zuko's first romance turned out so badly, but it is not his fault, and if you felt the same things for Jet, that is not your fault, either.” Katara blushes deeply at the guess. Not that it was a guess.

“I look back on it and he seems so... smarmy,” Katara says, “but at the time, he seemed charming and smooth.” She has a habit, when she is nervous, of gripping at the deck, moving her hands back and forth, making phantom snowballs. Stressful times in her village must have been littered with the things. “What if I _always_ fall for a pretty face?”

“Everyone has weaknesses. It is not wrong to have them, and recognizing your weaknesses is key to becoming stronger. That doesn't mean you have to get rid of them. Your brother, and your soulmate, and my nephew will always be there to help you. Listen to advice. As far as I am concerned, what went wrong is not that you or Zuko got caught up in the romance of the situation, but that you did not all talk and listen to each other. Your friends have just as much wisdom as I do. It is only up to you to listen to it.”

Katara's blush recedes. “Thank you, General Iroh.”

Iroh waves a hand. “You are Sokka's sister, and Sokka is my nephew's soulmate. Please, call me Uncle.” He has told her this several times, but by now, he is fairly sure it's a game.

After their chat, Katara goes to Zuko, and Sokka excuses himself from sparring with Suki, and they talk while Katara holds out her flask of bending water. An hour later, Aang comes out onto the deck. Appa gets up and slumps over to join them now that his person is there. They talk more, and Katara makes her water float out of the flask, and then Aang does it, and Zuko visibly tries, but fails, over and over until Sokka takes his hands and talks to him, soothing in his face.

When Zuko tries again, he gets it.

They're good for each other, Sokka and Zuko.

That makes sense. After all, they are soulmates.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So Gaipan actually has three gates, not one. I don't care. I'm not changing it, the moment is too good.


	10. Chapter 10

Sokka is pretty good with a sword.

Honestly, it makes Zuko a little angry, because it took him years to get this good, and here comes _Sokka the genius_ to get to an absolutely unfair level of skill for someone who's been using a sword for a few days, and yeah, so he was pretty handy in that fight back in Six Piers Burning, but he was wielding a _crab-spider leg_ that time, who knew the skills would translate to a sword?

Well

Zuko can still mop his ass up to the bow and clear back to the stern with one dao tied behind his back, and he's going to milk that as long as possible. He finishes demolishing Sokka for the day, sheathes his swords, and says, very carefully, “you're improving a little.”

Sokka glares at him while he goes to retrieve his own sword. It's a loan, one from the ship's stores that used to belong to Crewman Long, who... no longer needs it. Sokka is the one who... helped Crewman Long get past his need during the mutiny a few weeks ago, and although Sokka definitely knows he killed people in that fight, he also definitely doesn't know who all of the people he killed were, and Zuko isn't about to tell him. They'll get Sokka his own sword soon. Meantime... “Come on, Sokka. Let's get to Appa. We've got places to be.”

And okay, so Zuko can admit to himself that he enjoys making Sokka run. Uncle is already getting the first of his supplies into the packs on Appa's saddle, carefully placing his best travel tea set and some good teas. They've run into a deep inlet on the Earth Kingdom's west coast, but it's still going to be two days on Appa-back. 

Uncle is more freaked out than he lets on about the fact that Appa can fly. It figures that the one law he's most interested in following is the law of gravity. Maybe he'll agree about the four mile drop thing.

Zuko isn't packing much; swords, canteen, three outfits, some of those cookies Lieutenant Jee anxiety-baked when Uncle announced he was joining in this expedition _”I am going to join them on this one, Jee. I have things to ask Wu, as well.” “If you think that's wise, General. I'll be in the kitchen,”_ blue spirit mask, first aid supplies. It all fits in one bag, and when he finds Sokka after everyone else is done packing, Sokka is in the middle of packing up a third bag in his cabin.

“I'll be right there, I just have to get this...” he lapses into silence, bundles in a large blanket, and starts pulling the ties closed. 

Zuko goes to help. “Sokka, this is more than we need.”

Sokka shakes his head. “Two days to get there, allow for three, then two or three days there, and then two or three days back, so I'm packing for two weeks here, Zuko, and—“

“—why aren't you bringing your sword?” Zuko asks, pointing to the weapon where it's been placed neatly in the corner.

“I'm not good enough with it yet.”

Zuko used to have a habit of pinching the bridge of his nose when he was frustrated, but then ~~his father turned out to be an irredeemable monster, so~~ he had to move the gesture to avoid pinching sensitive scar tissue. He pinches his nose shut, inhales deeply through his mouth, and sighs gustily. “Sokka,” he says, and it comes out a little funny, so he lets go of the end of his nose. Sokka does not laugh. “I know I make fun of you, but I've been practicing with dao for years. You're good enough to take the sword.”

The way Sokka's face lights up is _not cute_ ~~yes, it very much is, actually.~~ He retrieves the weapon, straps it to his waist, and gathers up two of his bags. Zuko grabs the third. 

“So, I figure you can waterbend because I'm Water Tribe,” Sokka says. “I mean, we all kinda figured that one out, right?”

Zuko nods. “Yeah.”

Sokka heads out into the corridor. It's so narrow that he has to go sideways. With Suki coming along, too, Aang is definitely going to make him put one or two of those back. “So, I bet that means that I can firebend! Once I figure out how, I'm going to be an awesome, powerful bender!”

Zuko rolls his eyes, but he doesn't object to Sokka's continuous chatter about how great of a bender he's going to be, and how water never really was his element, and firebending looks really cool anyway, and besides, magic fire is so useful, but magic water is more “combat-ey,” you can't heat up a cup of tea with it or do welding or run a steam engine.

Aang makes Sokka put back two of the bags. Sokka talks him down to one, but he has to leave the heaviest one.

Sokka spends ten minutes reshuffling his luggage. Even Suki looks annoyed, and they're practically dating by now. They take off forty minutes after they were supposed to. When it gets cold, Sokka reaches into his bag, pulls out a blanket larger than any Zuko was aware they had on the ship, and says “See, I needed this stuff.”

Suki sighs. Katara smiles at Sokka. “Is there room for more?” she asks. When Sokka nods, Katara says “You're the smartest older brother I have,” and she piles under the blanket with him. Uncle and Suki exchange looks. Uncle will be fine. He uses his breath of fire on instinct now, and Zuko is pretty sure the man hasn't been cold since long before Ba Sing Se. 

“Thank you, Katara,” Sokka says. Zuko climbs in on the other side of him from Katara.

“You're the only older brother she has,” he points out. Suki looks between Uncle, Aang, the top of Appa's head, and the three of them, toasty under the blanket (Zuko could stay perfectly comfortable the same way as Uncle, but... he breathes deep and stokes his own fire higher. Might as well be a heater). 

“I know, and I'm also the smartest.” Sokka says. He looks smug for about a count of three before he abruptly says “hey!” and looks from Zuko to Katara and back again accusingly.

Suki climbs in, so that Zuko is between her and Sokka. “It's okay, Sokka. I _definitely_ like you for your brains.”

Sokka's smug look returns, stronger than ever. “Thank you, Suki.”

Suki and Katara share a smirk across Zuko and Sokka. After a few moments, Sokka says “But I am good looking, too, right? I mean, the scars make me all mysterious, and I've got a good body. Right?”

“Yeah!” Aang calls from up ahead while Suki is still pretending to deliberate on the question.

_“Thank you,_ Aang,” Sokka yells.

+

The volcano looks bad.

Admittedly, a lot of things look bad, and that might be down to flying, because Suki is still a little freaked out by the fact that _Appa can fly,_ and also that _Appa can fly with passengers,_ and very much so also by the fact that _one of the passengers on the ten ton flying bison monster is, in fact, Suki._ And, up here, the whole Sokka... issue... feels so damn complicated. After all, Sokka is somewhere north of intriguing, and he doesn't seem to realize that he's scary-smart, and when he isn't lashing out because of wounded pride, he's really, really nice, but also, he has a soulmate. And his soulmate is... not uninterested in romance? Maybe? It's a little hard to tell. After Six Piers Burning, it makes sense for them to be closer, and then the Jet incident, which has completely thrown Suki off. She doesn't even know if Sokka likes boys (although he definitely likes girls, that's easy to pick up on), but if he does, then this is probably never going to go anywhere. It's so much simpler on the ground.

So when Aang lands, Suki jumps down first. They head to the town gates while Aang and Iroh get Appa put away. The Dragon of the West has a reputation not only as a fearsome fighter and deft general, but also as a devoted intellectual. Learning the care and command of a flying bison totally fits. He'll probably vanish in a couple of months and then somehow come back with one of his own.

Sokka and Katara are bickering back and forth as they come to the gate in the town wall. “Look, I know Uncle Iroh said this Wu lady can predict the future, but even if she knows exactly when it's going to erupt, it's still smarter not to live right under a volcano like this. Besides, the predictions can't be that accurate. It's the _future,_ Katara!” Sokka says as they round the corner, and they all pause to take a look and let Iroh and Aang catch up.

Makapu village is beautiful. Unlike most of the Earth Kingdom, here there are warm golds and even some oranges and reds to complement sage greens and other calm, dark colors. This is a place that the war hasn't warped, even after a hundred years. At the top of a fairly mild hill sits a single larger building, three or four times the size of the others around it. 

“Wow,” Aang says behind her.

“Oh!” Iroh says. “This is very good early Kyoshi-period architecture! The old Earth Kingdom embassy in Caldera City looks just like these buildings!”

Someone comes hurrying up out of the village and waves to greet them. “Hello! Did you come from that creature we saw?”

Iroh nods. “We did. We were hoping to consult with Madam Wu.”

“I'm sure Aunt Wu will be happy to help,” the man says.

“You're her nephew then?” Zuko prompts. 

The man shakes his head. “Oh, no, no. I should be so lucky. No, we just all call her that. She likes it better than 'Lady' or 'Madam,' I guess.”

Suki peers to either side as they go. There are a few people watching them, and one... no, two, there's a little girl now... following them. Most of them probably know better than to tangle with a Kyoshi Warrior in full battle dress, but that might not actually stop them. Better to be vigilant.

Their guide takes them to the large building up on the hill, and Suki must be in touch with the spirits, because she totally predicted that. Inside, slightly out of breath, is the girl who was following them. Suki can't blame her. Her own first reaction to a giant flying monster was also to look at what was going on, before she learned that Appa is more cute and cuddly than scary. The hair could use work, though. Maybe it's traditional, or something, but to Suki, it just screams “handhold.”

“Hi!” the girl says once the door is closed. “I'm Meng. I'm Aunt Wu's assistant. Are you here to get your fortunes told?”

“Actually,” Suki says, “what we need is a little complicated. Could you go and get Aunt Wu, or see if we can all go talk to her together?”

Meng frowns, but she heads off, and a few minutes later, she comes back, gesturing them all through. As they pass, Suki hears her say to Aang “I like your ears. They're cute.”

“Um, thanks?” Aang says. 

Suki reaches out and tweaks his left ear. “They are cute, though.”

Aang giggles. It's adorable.

Aunt Wu herself turns out to be a sixtyish woman in a gold-and-yellow robe, wearing a diadem shaped like the Old North Kingdom Noble character for “wisdom” in her tall, greying hair. She looks them over, sighs gently, and gestures to a few cushions scattered around the room. “Please, sit,” she says.

Suki stays standing. So does Zuko. Suki likes Zuko: he's paranoid, too.

“Aunt Wu,” Aang says, “we're here because we have some questions about soulmates.”

Aunt Wu looks them over. Her eyes narrow, and she says “I have never seen a Water Tribesman whose soulmate is a Fire Nation citizen, let alone the crown prince. And if I'm not mistaken, I must be in the presence of the Avatar, as well. Which would make this lovely young lady the Avatar's soulmate.” She turns her intense scrutiny to Iroh. “I think you're a little old for the young warrior, though.” 

“Oh, no, I am not here with my soulmate,” Iroh says. “I do not have one. Nor does Suki. But you see, my nephew here... well, just recently, he saved a small town with waterbending. This is unusual, because he is a firebender. I know the signs of a soulmate, and some about their destinies, but I did not expect this.”

“You should have,” Aunt Wu says. “This was common knowledge a hundred years ago. A bender whose soulmate is from another nation can use that nation's bending, if their soulmate wills it and gives it over with a touch. At their next touch, it will be taken back.”

“So if Zuko touches me and lets me use his bending, I'll be a firebender?” Sokka is practically bouncing up and down on his cushion.

“Are you a waterbender?” Aunt Wu asks. Sokka shakes his head. “Then no. Whether or not you are a bender remains the same.”

Sokka blinks, deflates very slightly and then lets his head loll back and stares at the ceiling. “So let me get this straight.” He turns an accusing stare on Zuko. “You're a prince, you're taller than me, you have your own ship, your uncle is the coolest person ever, you're a firebender, and on top of all that, my being your soulmate just makes _you_ more awesome?”

Suki tries to memorize Zuko's smirk. It's a really good expression. “I guess so,” Zuko says. 

“You think Iroh is cooler than me?” Suki teases.

Sokka turns, looking guilty. “I mean... that was—“

“One of the nicest things anyone has ever said about me,” Iroh says with exactly enough sincerity that Sokka would look like a jerk if he took it back to compliment Suki, but not enough that Suki can't get away with still looking offended. It's masterful. The man is one of the evilest people Suki knows.

Bereft of options, Sokka turns back to Zuko. “Man, you are such a _jerkbender!”_

“No, he can only control water or fire,” Aang says. “If he was a jerkbender, he could've controlled Jet.”

Suki can't help her little chuckle. “I dunno, alone all night, I bet they did _some_ jerkbe—“

“Suki!” Zuko interrupts. He turns bright red. “We did not.”

Iroh makes a face. “What about the Avatar,” he says pointedly, and probably a little too loud.

Aunt Wu's tolerantly scandalized expression returns to a more normal, considering look. “The Avatar has always had a soulmate who is a bender from the same nation as they are,” she says. “The Avatar's soulmate is a little different. I know that this young man is the Avatar, but his soulmate is not an airbender. You see, the Avatar and their soulmate travel through the cycles of reincarnation differently from most people. They are souls tied together forever by the spirits, but other soulmates are tied together only for the lifetime of their destinies. The Avatar is born at the same time as their soulmate, they grow old together, they live together, and they die together. Tell me, Avatar, what happened to you?”

Suki's ears prick up. She has never heard the explanation, although during that storm, apparently Aang told Sokka, Zuko, and Katara. Sokka won't tell her what happened, though, so it must be very private. Aang frowns down at the floor, embarrassed. “I was frozen in an iceberg. Uncle says I was in something called 'the Avatar State' the whole time. Um... I remember a few times I woke up for a few seconds, and that was cold and scary, but I don't know why it happened.”

Aunt Wu nods. “I had heard rumors that there was a single airbender living in hiding near Omashu. He was supposed to be cold to the touch, like a ghost, and never grew any hair.” Katara and Sokka gasp. Aang's eyes go very, very wide. “The rumors said that he died of old age almost fifteen years ago. They also said that sometimes, in terrible danger, his eyes would glow and he would use incredibly strong bending. No one knows if the Avatar and their soulmate can trade bending elements. The Avatar's soulmate can't use an element that the Avatar wasn't born into, but they can use the Avatar State to accomplish things with their own element that no one else can. If your soulmate can bend both water and air, then she is probably going to become the most powerful bender in the world, besides you.”

Aang and Katara exchange a loaded look. “That's how I healed Sokka when they got their burn,” Katara says. “Can the Avatar and his soulmate use the Avatar State at the same time?”

“No,” Aunt Wu says.

“That's why I woke up a bunch of times,” Aang says. “I guess I needed the Avatar State to stay alive.”

“Right,” Sokka says. “Moving on from Avatars and jerkbenders, that volcano is going to explode soon. Don't you ever send people to check?”

Aunt Wu scoffs gently. “We have my fortunetelling,” she says. “We've never needed to check.”

Iroh smiles. “It is wise to check anyway. You only need to be wrong once in order for it to destroy your village, and right now the volcano is bubbling and starting to smoke.” Aunt Wu's face falls. “We saw it from the air.”

“Well... you're traveling with the Avatar, and most of you are benders, right? Surely you can stop it?”

The benders exchange nervous looks. Quietly, Iroh says “Not even the Avatar can stop a volcano from erupting. But we may be able to save your town.”

Aunt Wu looks pleased for a moment, and then panic creeps in slowly. It seems as though there is work to do.

But... “May I stay behind and talk to you, Miss Wu?” Suki asks as the others are filing out.

“Aunt Wu, please,” the old woman says. “And yes, you may. Sit down, let us consult.”

Katara slides the door shut behind her, and Suki lets herself settle onto a cushion. Keeping the others out of danger is out of the question: they're about to pick a fight with a fucking geological feature, might as well let it happen. “What do you wish to know?” Aunt Wu asks.

Suki takes a deep breath. “I need advice about... Sokka.”

“The Water Tribe boy?” Aunt Wu prompts. Suki nods, and Aunt Wu smiles. “You are very fond of him.”

“I think I might be falling for him,” Suki admits. 

“Doubtless,” Aunt Wu says. “He's far too young for me, but I can see why you might want him. You want to know how that would turn out?” Suki nods. Aunt Wu gets up to retrieve some supplies. As she sits back down, she continues, “your request is very specific. We will start broadly.” She scatters something across the floor. Bones. She nods, then picks one up and tosses it in the fire. It cracks and pops in the silence, until Aunt Wu pulls it out. She peers at the bone, inspecting it, then leans back. “The weave of your life is strong. You have been tested in battle, but your greatest battles are ahead of you. Your path will not be straight, and you will not walk it all beside your companions. When the time comes to leave them, you must do as you have always done and move along. There is an ascent in your future, a rise to glory no Kyoshi Warrior has achieved since the founding of your order.”

Suki takes this in stride. Others would think her arrogant, if they saw how unsurprised she is. The proper thing is for the news of great glory in your future to be startling, unexpected. Suki isn't arrogant. She's a realist. She's traveling with the Avatar, the exiled prince of the Fire Nation, and General Fucking Iroh. This is either going to end in glory or in a death so brutally thorough that it's a kind of glory all its own. Aunt Wu throws a few things in the fire, and thick smoke chokes the room.

After a long silence, the fortuneteller speaks again. “I see three great loves. One is a man... he is strong, but he will need you to remind him of that. Two are women, a woman like a spring morning and a woman like an winter night. You will know them by...” Aunt Wu is very quiet for a very long time. The smoke is almost cleared when she finishes, “you will know them by the sign of the wilting lotus. This is usually a bad omen.” She shakes her head. “I am sorry. I do not see Sokka in your future. That doesn't mean he is not one of your great loves, since I have not seen their names, but I cannot assure you of what I do not know.”

Suki nods. “Thank you.”

+

“Uncle Iroh says that you're the real deal, so I'm willing to give it a try,” Sokka says. The jerkbenders are all off jerkbending at a volcano, and instead of sitting around feeling inadequate with his boomerang and sword, a fortunetelling session seems in order.

Aunt Wu raises an eyebrow. “You are the last person I would have expected to come to me.”

Sokka picks idly at the cushion he's sitting on. He didn't notice when they were all there together, but these are _really_ pickable cushions. They're deeply textured, with fluffy pile on the raised bits. It's very pleasing to the fingers.

“I trust Uncle Iroh.”

Aunt Wu nods. “Do you have any questions you wish to ask me?”

“Will I ever have a girlfriend?” pops out of Sokka's mouth, ~~which is very close to the question he actually wants to ask,~~ before he can keep the question inside. Aunt Wu nods. She throws some stuff in the fire.

Nothing happens.

“Um,” Aunt Wu says. “Hold on.” She grabs a basket, throws something from it onto the ground, and about a dozen little bones bounce clear over the fire into Sokka's lap. “Well that wasn't supposed to happen,” Aunt Wu grumbles. “Come here.”

Sokka hands her the bones, and scoots over next to her. She seizes his hand, holding it palm up for her inspection. Dry fingertips trace along his increasingly sweaty palm. This whole experience is overwhelming, and this is especially hard. Sokka stares at the fire.

“Ah,” Aunt Wu mutters, and then, “hm. Your palms tell an interesting story. See here,” and Sokka can't help but to look, “you are entangled with the Moon, and the Sea, and the Sun. And here, and here, and here: all great turnings in your life. You are past one already. Meeting the Avatar, I suppose, or your soulmate. But these spirits that are entangled with your destiny are great powers. They won't reveal your future to me easily. Cast a bone into the fire for me.” Sokka reaches for the bones, and he throws one into the flames. It makes little popping sounds for a while, but when Aunt Wu draws it out with a pair of long tongs, it looks unchanged. Her fingers run over it, and she inspects the bone, then she takes either end of it and snaps it in two, inspecting the break. She shakes her head. “Girlfriend doesn't begin to describe it, child. Yes, there will be a woman, but more than that...” she shrugs. “I am sorry. The spirits are reticent for you, I am afraid.”

Well...

That's just great.

+

It's not that Katara is expecting anything in particular ~~except for probably that she's going to marry Aang~~ so much as it is that the idea of _knowing_ is incredibly appealing. There are so many questions that she wants to ask, and they all feel like the most important question, so in the ends she just lets Aunt Wu guide the fortunetelling. She can come back and ask more questions later.

Aunt Wu looks nervous as she scatters herbs in the fire. When thick smoke rises up, she sighs in obvious relief. “Oh! I see him. You are tied so closely to the man you will marry! He is your soulmate. You will do incredible things together.” She lets out a happy little sigh, her face mostly obscured by smoke. “Hmm... Come and give me your palm.”

Katara comes around the fire. Aunt Wu looks down at her outstretched hand. “Well... that's unusual.”

“What?” Katara asks.

“You have a scar over your lifeline.”

Katara looks. “Oh. Yeah, I think that's Aang's. I've always had it.”

+

“It's from a bat-lemur. I was handling one when I was three, and it got startled by an avalanche and bit me trying to get away.”

Aunt Wu lets go of his hand. “Well, that solves that mystery,” she says. She settles on her cushion and gestures Aang around to the other side of the fire. “And before you ask, yes, you are going to marry your soulmate. If you want that to happen faster, I would suggest not bringing it up to her. She already knows, and she's taking things at her own speed.”

Aang does his best not to make a face. He mostly (partly) succeeds. Aunt Wu has him select a bone from her little bucket of bones, and then toss it in the fire as she explains gently about the practice. The cracks in the bones will tell, she says.

The bone cracks.

And then it cracks again, and begins to crumble. “I've never seen this before,” she says.

The bone crumbles completely away and thick black smoke sputters up from the fire. Aunt Wu exclaims in surprise, and Aang reels back from the unexpected display.

“Does that mean something good?” Aang asks. He knows it doesn't but hey, what if it does?

Aunt Wu shakes her head. “I don't know what it means. But you surely have an incredible future in store.”

+

“Get out. It was disturbing enough to read your soulmate's fortune, I won't read yours,” Aunt Wu says.

Zuko shrugs. He sends Uncle in. Yet another weird thing about Sokka.

+

“I don't want to hear my fortune told,” Iroh says once he is settled on a cushion next to Aunt Wu. “Instead, may I guess at your fortune? If I am wrong, I will buy you a very fancy dinner.”

Wu smiles at him. “You can try,” she says.

Iroh makes his move. “I predict that you will enjoy a very nice evening with me tonight. I will treat you to dinner, and we will dance. It will be a wonderful time, and although our time together will be short, we will always look back on it fondly.”

Wu blushes very delicately. “It may take me some time to discover if your prediction is correct.”

“I will be leaving tomorrow,” Iroh says.

She lets him know in the morning that his prediction was spot on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Iroh can _get it._


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Be warned, there are multiple fairly detailed descriptions of peril at sea, including a full-on sea battle in this one, so be prepared for some moderate violence.

Hakoda really, really, _really_ hates the Fire Navy. First off, that should be a contradiction in terms. He's _Water Tribe,_ dammit, the ocean should be the one place where he's always got an advantage, especially over the Fire Nation, but he's stuck using his ships' speed, numbers, and agility to outmaneuver and get the drop on the Fire Navy. Why in the shitting fuckstains he can't stand up in a fight against the Fire Navy is honestly beyond him—not the physical causes, but the philosophical one, that let the _Fire Nation_ dominate the _water_ as though that's any kind of fair.

For another thing, the ship they've apparently kidnapped his _son_ onto is, by all appearances, stupid fast. He's outpaced nearly every Fire Navy ship he's ever come across, and the _one time_ a ship has his family on board, it's too fast to catch. 

What, and he does mean this with all sincerity and feeling, the absolute pisshammer?

Still, there's been good hunting along the way. That little dustup in Port Lao Wen notwithstanding, they've done an excellent job, and beating the _Snapdragon_ to the Bay of Weeping Mothers hasn't been that difficult. Just like Bato thought, the Fire Nation ship has taken the inland route. Of course, the rumors in every port and on every ship point to Banished Prince Zuko of the Fire Nation having switched to traveling inland, but they also say he's on a flying bison(?) and the rumors about the Avatar have persisted and also apparently they flooded a town to save it from a volcano? The details are pretty fuzzy on that one. At least he hasn't heard about anything like what happened at Six Piers Burning (those poor girls. That poor pig-bull. And the _octodolphins!)_ again.

But he's only got one more chance at this. They've come around to the north of where the _Snapdragon_ might be emerging from the Bay of Weeping Mothers. He's left Bato injured and waiting on the shore barely inside the bay, at that abbey. Who knows, maybe they'll meet Bato first.

And then the Fire Nation Prince will murder his injured second on sight.

This is a terrible plan.

A plume of smoke appears on the horizon. Bato snaps orders, rattling them off one at a time, calm, careful, definitely not nervous.

The _Snapdragon,_ if things hold true to that time they missed the ship three inlets back, can make somewhere between eight and twelve beats all out: slightly faster than his own _Tata-Lee's_ seven. Well, the river mouth he's hiding in should take care of that advantage. He watches the column of smoke, and he orders the anchor up when it's at the right point. They're going slow.

The _Tata-Lee_ blasts forwards, oars pushing the ship hard. The _Snapdragon's_ smoke plume is nearly to the river mouth when Hakoda hoists the sail with his crew. The oars come out, the grapplers come around, and they blast out about a quarter of a length behind the ship.

It's smaller than he expected. The grapplers' hooks bite and hold, and the _Tata-Lee_ is going so fast that her momentum nearly pulls the other ship over. For a terrible moment, Hakoda remembers every child that has plunged into the icy waters of home, never to return. Of course, they're in temperate waters here. If he dunks his son into the sea, it will be drowning or being crushed under the ship that kills him, not cold.

And this ship is _tiny!_ It could fit _inside_ of the ship that's been described to him. And also it looks completely different to the ship he glimpsed a week and a half ago.

This isn't the _Snapdragon._ As they circle around, Hakoda fights with the sinking certainty that he's going to have to explain _again_ to the Earth Kingdom Port Office that he's not a pirate, it's just hard to be completely sure what's crossing the mouth of a river when you're laying an ambush.

_Lily Pad,_ says the elegant Caldera Formal Script across the little ship's bow. There's some shouting, and a figure in red runs across to the front of the ship. He's followed by a figure in blue, and couple in white. They run to the grapple lines, and only throw them off as they hit the turnaround of their listing. It's really expert seamanship, and a tactic only the Water Tribe knows. 

The _Lily Pad_ rocks back and forth. One of the figures in white vomits over the side as Hakoda brings the _Tata-Lee_ alongside the ship.

The figure in red is his son. That's his Sokka.

Something in Hakoda takes hold of all rational thought and strangles it. They are still nearly twenty feet between the boats, but Hakoda runs full-tilt across the deck and jumps, and Gilak is definitely going to make a silly song up about it later, but Hakoda catches the other ship's gunwale and thuds into the side without once touching the water, and the hands that pull him up are Sokka's.

“Dad?” Sokka says.

Hakoda reaches for his scimitar and draws it out, the vicious bone blade a comfort in his hand. 

“Dad!” Sokka yells.

Someone is approaching from the side, moving like a bender. Hakoda knows what to do about benders. He swings.

Something hits his sword hand, blasting it back against the big boiler-and-cabin structure, then turns cold, freezing him there.

His eyes register who he just drew on, and he sags.

Finally, words come back to him. “Katara?”

His daughter nods. “Hi Dad.”

+

Hakoda looks pretty good, for someone who's just had his entire world turned over several times in a row. When he spots Bato in the _Snapdragon's_ launch bay, he gravitates towards his fellow tribesman like he's being drawn by the current. Bato reaches out with his good arm to wrap Hakoda up in a gentle hug.

“I guess they told you?” Bato says.

Hakoda nods, burying himself in Bato's shoulder. It's nice, after being apart for almost a week.

“You almost capsized the _Lily Pad,_ didn't you?”

Hakoda nods again. “Bato, my daughter's soulmate is the _Avatar._ The Avatar, Bato! What am I supposed to do with that?”

“Learn some Air Nomad traditions?” Bato suggests.

“And my son keeps calling _The Dragon of the West_ 'Uncle!' And they're all here! How am I supposed to keep up with it all?”

“To be fair, the Dragon of the West makes a really good oolong.”

Hakoda shifts so that he is pressed up against Bato's chest, with his chin resting (painfully) at the top of his solar plexus. He stares with wide, pleading eyes and his hands grip Bato's hips, more like he's looking for a lifeline than like he's trying to get a reaction out of him. He's nice and warm. “Bato, you're not helping.”

“I know, but I freaked out quietly two nights ago, after the Avatar landed a giant monster in the abbey, and now I'm done. Did you know Iroh taught Sokka to play the pipa? He's pretty good.”

“Batooooo,” Hakoda whines warningly, but he is cut off by the scrape of the _Tata-Lee_ being dragged into the bay. Hakoda straightens up, all business, and supervises the bringing on board of the ship. Between the _Lily Pad_ , Bato's little skiff, and the _Tata-Lee,_ they're stretching their capacity more than a little.

Hakoda sticks eagerly by his side as they make their way up to the bridge a few minutes later. Bato desperately hopes everyone is at least a little more on their best behavior than they have been the last few days. All of the former Fire Navy people still give them a wide berth, ducking into doorways as they pass. They're already intimidated by Bato's height. And width. And general mountainous aspect. The determination that Hakoda is using to cover up his abject terror adds a nice urgency to the way they leap aside, especially with Sokka and Katara in their wake.

When they get to the bridge, the open space is a relief. Hakoda sticks right next to Bato's side, and Bato rests a steadying hand on his shoulder. Sokka moves past them, and first Aang, then Zuko drop down from some conversation or another on the lookout deck. Aang stands ramrod straight and trembling with nerves, while Zuko sends a half-challenging stare at Hakoda. Then Katara steps up to Aang, and she calms him with a hand on his elbow. At the same time, Sokka punches Zuko once on the arm, coming to rest just beside him. Zuko rolls his eyes, but he also smiles. 

Bato has met soulmates before. Hila and Ha, who left the village together when he was young. Fir Bu and Goh, those buccaneers preying on the Fire Navy while they search for their third soulmate. Jazoh and Hii, the firebending masters who had to be killed by the whole fleet working together. Seeing soulmates together is _still_ one of the most profoundly moving experiences he ever has. Aang and Katara echo each other, their every move infused with a deep rightness that strengthens both of them. Sokka and Zuko are alert, warriors in perfect harmony with each other, each covering the other from moment to moment, ready to guard, ready to support, ready to correct. It leaves Bato a little awestruck, and when Hakoda sees them, he gasps.

Zuko waves. Awkward little guy, really.

+

The whole idea of meeting his soulmate's dad is terrifying. Bato is, like, Katara's (if Aang understands the explanation, which he's not sure he does) half-dad, or war-dad, or something like that, but he's really nice, even if he is the single most unbelievably gigantanormous person Aang has ever seen in his life. But Hakoda...

The man looks _exhausted_ with heavy, dark circles under eyes made to scowl, on a tall face with cheekbones that would be very handsome if he didn't look so wrung out. He's glaring at Zuko, then at Uncle Iroh, then, with _very slightly_ less venom at Aang.

Aang would rather be in a small, dark room under a giant pile of blankets getting the _hugging of his life_ from Katara because Katara and Zuko because warm.

“I'm guessing you're the Avatar,” Hakoda says after a while.

Aang nods. Katara squeezes his elbow. He looks up long enough to meet Hakoda's eyes for a moment. Pale blue, like the water in the Great Pool at the Eastern Temple.

Hakoda's eyes flit away. Aang looks back down at the ground. The deck. There's no ground here. “You must be Prince Zuko,” Hakoda says.

“Uh... yeah,” Zuko says. “Zuko. Right here.” He waves again. Yeah, he said not to be so nervous, since they're Sokka and Katara's soulmates, that makes them family, and Chief Hakoda won't hurt family. Zuko doesn't seem to be taking his own advice to heart.

“And you must be General Iroh.” Hakoda isn't asking.

“I am,” Uncle says. “We have a lot to discuss. We are taking Katara, Aang, and Zuko to the Northern Water Tribe, where they will find a waterbending teacher.”

“Zuko?” Hakoda repeats. “Why would Zuko need a waterbending teacher?”

+

The Bay of Weeping Mothers is a trap. Zhao knows better than to fall for a trap, so he stays out. Even if there weren't sinister tales of Fire Navy ships going missing, and dark rumors of Water Tribe holdouts attacking military and civilian targets alike, he wouldn't follow the _Snapdragon_ in there. Jee runs a tight ship, and he's still a lieutenant because he's loyal to a political deadweight, not because he's incompetent. 

_Was_ still a lieutenant. Now he's a corpse who needs to be escorted to his grave. Preferably under the watchful, tearful eyes of His Royal Disgrace and the water boy. The _Beetle_ will come out on top of this fight, and Zhao is going to do everything in his power to make it an excruciating experience for the banished prince.

But in order to win this fight, he needs to be in open water, not the treacherous, rocky Bay of Weeping Mothers. Jee would run them aground in minutes there. Hiding in a river is a Water Tribe tactic, but it's also very effective. When the _Snapdragon's_ smoke is in position, they take off fast. The _Beetle's_ smoke will give them away, but they're close enough that they won't be able to do anything about it. Zhao calls out to the catapult crew and the firebenders, and the _Beetle_ blasts out of their hidey-hole, cutting off the prince's ship. 

On the deck of the _Snapdragon,_ Zhao spots a huge, white creature. The Avatar's monstrosity. A boy in orange and yellow runs across the deck as Jee's ship turns hard to port, and Zhao yells “FIRE!”

The boy in orange and yellow lifts a quarterstaff and little wings pop out of it. He grabs ahold of it and soars into the air, batting one of the catapult rounds off target with a well placed blast of air. The Avatar. Of course, one catapult round and ten firebolts hit the _Snapdragon._ The firebolts don't do much, but the catapult smashes the aft smokestack. The water boy runs to the Avatar's monstrosity, followed by...

heavens... there's more of them now...

Four sizable Water Tribe Warriors. 

The water boy guides the creature into the air with its furious cargo, and they make the short hop over. Zhao bends a twisting gout of fire at the monster, pushing it back into the air to try to circle around behind.

“Repel boarders!” Zhao yells. His firebenders take up position to keep the beast back while his catapult crew works to reload as quickly as possible. More flames fly up overhead, and Zhao turns to see the Avatar spinning and twisting in midair, desperately fending off assaults from his benders.

Then the other half of Zhao's trap goes off. The _Grinning Dragon_ sweeps out of her own cover to the south, and lets fly with all four catapults.

One shot hisses into the water short of the _Snapdragon._ The other three crash into the aging cruiser's hull in a trio of profound crunches. Flames gush over the gunwales. The Avatar yells, falls ten feet, recovers, and swoops towards the larger ship. A few drops of blood scatter from his forehead. The _Snapdragon_ is listing now, the windows on her bridge shattered and her speed badly cut by damage. She's trying to limp away, but Zhao's catapults are ready again. They fire.

The Avatar can't turn around in time to deflect them, and Zhao decides to promote his catapult operator right then and there when one of the rounds smashes through the side of the bridge. A burning human figure leaps from the shattered windows and smashes into the deck below. Zhao sincerely hopes it's Jee.

A cascade of fire signals the entry of General Iroh into the fight, but Zhao hurries forward and disperses it. Barely. Before he can retaliate, Iroh is retreating below deck. In fact, the _Snapdragon's_ deck is suddenly totally deserted. 

This is not unexpected. “Catapults, target the boat bay!” Zhao yells. His operators start adjusting their aim. Iroh will try to escape on the skiff. Four more shots from the _Grinning Dragon_ rock the _Snapdragon,_ and the traitors' ship is definitely taking on water by now. Her list grows more and more pronounced. The Avatar's monster circles away from Zhao's ship, and drops the four Water Tribe warriors. Just before the other ship's deck tilts up too far for Zhao to see, a couple of figures emerge from the superstructure.

Two catapults fire behind him, and the _Snapdragon's_ boat bay is smashed. Their skiff will never get through the dented, crumpled door. 

The Avatar's beast takes off. Zhao stares. The Avatar joins the beast. He can see... the Avatar, the water boy, the prince, and a girl are on the back of the creature. He can still capture Iroh.

As though to punctuate the thought, the door of the _Snapdragon's_ boat bay explodes open in a burst of fire. The battlefield falls silent for a moment, and then flames roar inside the dying ship.

It's not the skiff that comes out. It's a Water Tribe ship, riding a column of fire so huge and intense that Zhao's hair begins to sizzle and curl. Six catapults reach out to strike the ship, but it arcs gracefully around in a wide turn, and all six shots fall wide. As the Water Tribe ship heads out to sea, the column of fire fades, and then picks up, somewhat less intense. 

Zhao turns his attention back to the ruined hulk of the _Snapdragon_ as General Iroh rockets away with the tatters of Zhao's career as a hostage.

He watches the old cruiser's nose slowly duck below the waves, her venerable stern lifting into the air just slightly. There are very few barnacles. Jee ran a tight ship. The _Snapdragon's_ death, in the end, is almost peaceful, left alone after being holed, so that she takes about half an hour to sink. Zhao's scouts report that there are five dead aboard the ship. Two girls, Kyoshi Warriors, from the look of it. One Fire Nation traitor, not Jee. Two old men in white, who look like Earth Kingdom citizens. When the last ripples from the _Snapdragon_ have faded away, Zhao spits into the sea and starts for his cabin. There's a bottle of wine that his doctors say he can't have yet, and he's going to go break a rule.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oof. I got attached to the _Snapdragon_ writing the previous chapters, but I always knew she needed to go. This chapter still hurt to write.


	12. Chapter 12

When they land, it's only because Appa is exhausted. Appa can fly, but not _forever_ and Aang refuses to push it any more than they already have. Besides, he's clearly getting badly overstimulated, and if Zuko has to deal with him being obnoxious any longer, he's going to scream.

Not that Aang is _bad._ He's just... a lot. He helps while they set up camp, he smiles at Zuko as though Zuko is doing something truly incredible just by lighting the fire, he helps Sokka forage.

Katara stares into the fire. “I don't know their names,” she says. “I never finished learning all the Kyoshi Warriors' names, and those two... in the hallway...”

Zuko reaches out and squeezes her hand. He never wants to even come close to experiencing what it was like in that ship again. He's a little surprised that he would go to extremes to keep Katara from going through it, too. Her, or Aang, or Sokka. “It's funny. I hated that ship. I hated it so much. I always told Uncle, when we finally left it behind, that I'd send it to the bottom of the ocean. But watching it go down like that... That hurt.” He sighs. The fire jumps with his breath. “Those men, the ones who stayed from the original crew? I think they did more to raise me than either of my parents. Definitely more than my father. They didn't...”

“It was your father, right?” Katara says, gesturing to the burn on his left eye.

Zuko nods. “I refused to fight him, so he burned me.” He reaches out, and it says something that she's comfortable enough to let him cover her left eye with his right hand. “Just like this.” His hand drops.

Katara's eyes flick to his, then back to the fire. “Once, when I was six, I went out past the village wall without telling anyone where I'd gone. When I got back, Dad yelled at me in front of the whole village. I was humiliated. I told him he was the worst dad ever. Every time I see that scar, I remember that, and I feel so lucky. I wish I'd known how to heal. I wish I could have kept your father from marking you that way.”

Zuko shakes his head. “I'm kind of a huge asshole. I probably would've gotten the lesson burned into me somewhere else.”

“Oh, you are such an asshole, Zuko,” Sokka says from across their little clearing, dropping an armload of firewood with a small pile of foraged tubers next to the fire. “But I think I like your kind of asshole.” He frowns. “That came out wrong.”

Katara blushes clear up to her hair (which is starting to be long enough for a little bit of styling, weeks ahead of Zuko's own increasingly-itchy mess), and when Aang comes back moments behind Sokka's comment, he says “Sokka, if you like Zuko's butt, you should tell him in private.”

Katara blushes even worse. 

Sokka grins. “It is a nice butt,” he says. He holds up his hands, framing out a shape that Zuko _knows_ is not what his butt is shaped like. “Very perky and round. It looks firm, like you could bounce stuff off of it.”

“Sokka, stop, or your sister is going to have a stroke,” Zuko says. He feeds a little more wood into the fire. 

“Stop, or your sister is going to kill you,” Katara says.

“I'd rather you didn't,” Aang and Sokka say at the same time.

Zuko shrugs. “Go ahead, if you must, but make it quick, I don't want to suffer.”

“Hey!” Sokka yells, but he's laughing, and the four of them, plus a chattering Momo and a gently snoring Appa, lift each other's spirits. After they've all eaten, Katara surprises everyone by pulling Sokka's pipa out of her bag. Sokka gasps in delight, double-checks the tuning, and starts playing them a song. Zuko recognizes _Four Seasons,_ but when nobody sings, Sokka slowly starts trailing off. Zuko closes his eyes. He knows he's turning red, but he gestures for Sokka to keep going. He jumps in at the appropriate point, and by the third chorus, Aang's bright voice and Katara's sweet one have joined him.

Sokka runs through all the songs he knows, and by the time Aang has fallen asleep and Katara has coaxed him to their tent, Zuko isn't even particularly embarrassed to sing. On the ship, he'd always been afraid people would judge him for his husky voice, or think it was undignified for him to perform.

Sokka lets the music stop. He sets the instrument aside. They are sitting close together, knees touching, watching the fire. “I'm sorry we couldn't stop Zhao,” Sokka says. “If it was just the one ship, maybe, but...” He shakes his head. “At least Uncle got out okay.”

“Thanks to your dad,” Zuko says. He leans back. His fingers tangle in the little tufts of grass that litter the ground not far from the fire. He picks and pulls at them. “Fuck. I thought he was gonna _kill_ me when he walked onto the bridge.”

“I was a little worried, too,” Sokka admits. “But dude... you're my soulmate. Like, literally my soulmate.” He pulls Zuko's right hand from the grass with his left. “You know...” He slots his fingers in between Zuko's. “You know I... I mean, you know? I love you, you know?”

Zuko ~~snorts~~ laughs once, quietly, in a very dignified manner. “Of course I know, you dork.” He looks up at the sky. There are low clouds scudding by overhead, but intimate personal acquaintance with the weather up high reassures him there won't be rain. “You know I love you, too, right?”

And there's something in Zuko that very much wants to say something extremely stupid right now, or possibly to pull Sokka close and

Soulmates are supposed to love each other. It's destiny, the world saying that these two go together. And he does. Love Sokka, that is. It's taken him a very, very long time, especially considering that they're actually literally soulmates. But he loves Sokka, and he loves Katara, and he loves Aang, and he loves Appa, and he is terrified of Momo. And he loves Sokka.

“Dude,” Sokka says into the silence. “Did we just have a _moment?”_

“Never mind, I hate you,” Zuko says. “I'm trading you for Aang.” Sokka splutters, but Zuko goes on, “Katara has been dealing with you for fourteen years, she can keep you.”

It's a good night.

+

Sokka has, on occasion, resented Zuko. 

That's not entirely accurate.

Sokka resented Zuko for the first month they knew each other. Since then, he has resented him sometimes, with continually decreasing frequency. Right now, though, he really resents their circumstances more than anything. There's a festival going on achingly close, and Zuko is absolutely right about the fact that it would be a terrible idea to go.

Aang, then Sokka, then Katara, then all three of them have tried to come up with some way they can go, some way they can attend in secret. It's part of Zuko's _culture,_ he's probably attended a bazillion of these festivals, and they can't go. Instead, they hide in the woods not far from the festival, and Katara teaches Zuko and Aang to heal with waterbending by repeatedly nicking her thumb and having them take turns healing it. Aang keeps making little hisses of pain.

Sokka really wants to go to the festival.

Zuko is right, though. If they were to go, they'd be spotted. Probably. Not for the first time, Sokka wishes Aang would grow his hair out for the sake of blending in. Katara says that's culturally insensitive, ~~and therefore Sokka does not wish it fervently, only in passing,~~ but it would still be more convenient, and if ever they have to travel in the Fire Nation, it will be almost unavoidable. 

The sun sets over the distant town with its distant festival, and a hand lands on Sokka's shoulder, interrupting his thoughts. Zuko sighs, and spits out a little trickle of fire as he sits down. “Hey,” he says. “Your sister and the Avatar are busy making goo-goo eyes at each other because they're totally not a couple, so I think healing practice is over.”

“You get to go to these things all the time,” Sokka says.

Zuko shrugs. “The last couple of years, yeah.” He grins. “Uncle encouraged it. He said being out of the palace meant we could enjoy the simple things. You know he can't even handle a whole bag of fire flakes?”

“What are fire flakes?” Sokka asks.

Zuko grins. “There's a bunch of different kinds, but the traditional recipe is that you make a runny unleavened batter, and you mix in cayenne, cinnamon, turmeric, onion, garlic, and the hottest dried pepper crumbles you can get, and then you spread the batter really thin over a griddle that's as hot as you can get it. While it's cooking, you glaze it with honey and brown sugar, then, when the sugar is just starting to burn, you scrape it all off and serve it in a bag.”

Sokka's mouth starts watering about halfway through the description. He understands why they didn't have that on the ship: the spices must be expensive. That doesn't mean he doesn't want it. “You're not helping with my urge to gatecrash this stupid festival.”

Zuko leans back. He stares at the sky. Sokka watches his face. “Maybe... with the sun down... and we all have some Fire Nation clothes...”

“I thought it was 'way too dangerous no matter how careful we are,'” Sokka teases.

“I know!” Zuko shakes his head. “I know. It's just... fire flakes are important. Even if no one in the Colonies does them right.”

“Sounds like you know how to do them,” Sokka says.

Zuko blushes. It's adorable. Sokka reflects on the times when he used to be scared of Zuko. That was dumb of him. Zuko is a turtleduck with a pissy attitude. “We'll get the ingredients next time we get supplies, and I'll try it,” he says, “but I've never done it myself before.”

Sokka leans back next to Zuko. Their fingertips are barely touching. Zuko is one of the few people Sokka lets sit to his left. He knows he's one of the few for Zuko, too. Right now, Zuko's on his left, instead of the other way around. 

There's a distant _thunk_ sound, and something explodes over the town. Sokka resists the urge to jump up, and he just watches. Fireworks. Explosions in blue, green, purple, red, and pink scatter through the sky. The light reflects off of Zuko's face when Sokka turns to look at him, ~~and he really wants to~~ kiss ~~Zuko into next week,~~ and it softens his burns and brings them out sharper in turns, and when the burns are highlighted, his features are softened, and when the burns are washed out, the shape of his face grows sharper. ~~It's incredible to look at, almost better than the fireworks. _Definitely_ better than the fireworks.~~

Zuko turns, and oh, yeah, he's just caught Sokka looking. A little smile grows across his face. Zuko looks _good_ when he's happy. 

~~Sokka should definitely~~ kiss ~~him.~~

~~Ma~~ ybe he will. Sokka leans just a little closer, and then Aang yells “Fireworks!” and sits down on the other side of Zuko from him, dragging Katara by the hand.

Zuko's smile quirks up a little further. ~~Disappointingly,~~ he doesn't ~~kiss Sokka,~~ but he does scoot closer, and Sokka tenses up a little and then immediately relaxes at a warm weight on his shoulder. Snuggling with Zuko is pretty nice.

“You're not gonna be able to handle fire flakes,” Zuko predicts.

“You're gonna eat those words, jerkbender,” Sokka replies.

“No, I'm gonna eat the rest of your fire flakes, because you won't be able to handle them.”

Zuko cuddles in closer to Sokka's side, and they spend the rest of the fireworks show gradually getting closer and closer. Aang and Katara do, too, so Sokka at least knows that if Katara teases, he'll have ammunition to fire back.

+

Traveling with the ship isn't something Katara should have gotten _used to_ so quickly, but she definitely misses it. The luxury of having a cabin, a little room all her own, still calls to her. As much as she loves Aang, and as much as she loves her brother (and Zuko, she supposes), she misses having her own space. And this is going to be their last stop where they might get that at least until they get to the Northern Water Tribe. Of course, that's assuming the Northern Air Temple isn't littered with the remains of a genocide, which it may well be.

They come over the ridge, and Katara stares. The Northern Air Temple isn't full of death. It's _occupied,_ with gliders not much different from Aang's circling around it, including three that are much larger.

“What?” Zuko blurts behind her.

“What is it?” Sokka asks.

Zuko shakes his head. “When I was first searching for... um... when I was first exiled, I started by going to the Air Temples. I wasn't allowed to get into the Western Air Temple because it's in Fire Nation territory. I went there anyway, because I always do the dumbest thing I can, but when I tried to go to the Northern Air Temple, a patrol caught me and turned me away. They must have been hiding this.

“Are they survivors?” Katara asks hopefully. “Maybe the Fire Nation is keeping them prisoner.”

“No,” Aang says. “They're not airbenders. Watch. See the way they go up, and then down, in those big, long loops?”

There are a few moments of silence, and then Sokka says “they're riding an updraft. Wind goes up the mountainside there,” he points, “and they catch it and ride up, then they dive down and catch it again. If they were airbenders, some of them might be doing that for fun, but not all of them. So probably, if none of them are flying the way Aang does, it's because none of them can.”

“They're copying Air Nomad gliders, but they changed it so the wings are longer and more like bird wings, and those gliding chairs are completely different,” Aang adds.

Katara watches a while longer, noting all the things they've said. If they're not airbenders, that means they must be Earth Kingdom, Water Tribe... or Fire Nation. If the Fire Nation knows they are there and leaves them alone, that means...

“They're Fire Nation,” Katara concludes.

Aang brings Appa straight up into the clouds. Katara gathers water to her hands, Sokka grips Zuko's arm _(maybe_ to transfer his bending? They've been pretty touchy lately, and Katara is starting to think there's something... boyfriend-flavored... going on) and groans. “Are we really about to kick the Fire Nation out of here? How many benders do they have?”

“Not enough,” Zuko says. “Someone give Momo a knife, he does pretty good with a knife.” While Sokka collapses into a giggling fit, Zuko wraps the clouds around his hands. “Your bending is cold,” he complains at Katara.

And then Aang jumps off of Appa. A sharp glow lights up the clouds, and Sokka yelps as he grabs Appa's reins. 

+

The glowing boy is terrifying. Teo spends most of the day hiding, because when a stranger (and that's a rarity on its own) comes arrowing out of the sky, furious, glowing, and at the center of a _tornado,_ you make yourself scarce. He and Che and Likeng vanish into the middle passages as soon as Dad assures everyone that it's safe, and _maybe_ they kill time by making out, but that's not for anyone to know until someone _totally_ walks in on them, and since Che is the one who notices first, the only warning Teo gets is a loud cry of “Oh shit!”

“Oh fuck, I'm so sorry,” the stranger says, and it isn't the glowing boy, but it's still a stranger. He's hiding his eyes behind his hands. He's dressed in red, a nice tunic with short sleeves over darker red pants, a pair of sword hilts just visible behind his head. “I probably should have expected you to be... uh... intimate, since the Mechanist told me you're soulmates and all sort of... I should go. I shouldn't have looked for you, I'm sorry, I should go.” He turns to leave, still blocking off his view of them.

“Wait,” Likeng says, and even though Che gives her a look like he thinks she's crazy, Teo kind of agrees. This guy didn't mean to interrupt them, even if their meeting is... _incredibly_ awkward.

The guy stops, and he turns, and _sweet crap_ that is a major burn. Teo can feel his soulmates wincing in sympathy right along with him. The guy sighs, but Teo speaks up. “If you were looking for us, you must have something to say, right?”

The guy nods. “Um. Hi, I'm Zuko.” He turns his head to the left, then the right, almost like he's looking for someone. It's almost like how confused Che gets without Teo and Likeng there.

Oh.

Okay, that makes sense.

“Soulmate stuff?” Teo guesses.

“Huh?” says Che and “what?” says Likeng, but Zuko nods.

“Do you know who it is?” Teo asks.

Zuko nods. A little smile crosses his face as he approaches. “Sokka. He's the Water Tribe boy I'm traveling with. I just...” Zuko stops a few feet away from them. He leans back against the wall. “How do you know how you're supposed to feel about your soulmate? Because... I... I think I might be, um... in love with him?”

Likeng laughs at him, but Teo shushes her. “Likeng, listen to him. Don't laugh.” Teo knows what it's like to be laughed at. They all do. She goes a little red. 

“We met when we were babies,” Che says. “When the flood hurt Teo, it hurt me and Likeng, too. We've always knows we're soulmates. When did you and Sokka meet?”

Uh oh. Che is doing his wisdom thing again. He's the oldest, by about six months (and Teo is big enough to admit that he's a little jealous that Che already gets to do the fourteen-year-old stuff), and he tends to offer wisdom a lot, whether it's any help or not. Still, Zuko answers, “we met almost three months ago when I invaded his village to capture the Avatar. He offered to come with me if I left his people alone, but it turned out that the Avatar really had been at his village, and he followed us with Sokka's sister, who is also _his_ soulmate, I mean, the Avatar's soulmate, but we... um... didn't get along? I mean, me, and the others. But now we're all together because when the Fire Nation heard about my soulmate being a Water Tribe boy, they were... not... understanding.”

“That... is really complicated,” Che says.

Likeng nods. Teo moves closer to Zuko. “It sounds like you've gotten to like each other well enough. And you and Sokka have been together all that time?”

“Well, I avoided him a lot. But a few weeks ago, we were in the Colonies, and there was this band of Freedom Fighters. Their leader was this guy named Jet, and he...” Zuko glares at the ceiling. “This is so embarrassing. He kind of... seduced me?”

Likeng snorts a little. So does Che. Teo does not, because Teo bites his lip, hard. The image of someone seducing this incredibly awkward guy is kinda hilarious, and his embarrassment is powerfully funny on its own, too. 

“Anyways, after that, Sokka and I started getting closer, and now...”

“That is really complicated,” Teo says. “I guess you hadn't even thought about boys before? Che and I were like that. Likeng had to tell us we had a crush on each other. It was confusing.”

Zuko nods. “I was mostly all about honor. My Uncle says I get really fixated.” He starts fidgeting with the hem of his shirt. 

“Right,” Teo says. “Well, I think the thing to do is to tell him how you feel. He's your _soulmate._ He won't hurt you, even if he doesn't feel the same way.”

Zuko squeezes his eyes shut.

“Right. Okay. You're right. Trust. I can trust. Trust is a thing I can do.” He looks down at his feet, wrapped in shoes that really aren't warm enough for the temple. Most of his outfit isn't warm enough, really. He looks back up at Teo. “Let's pretend I'm incredibly fucked up and I can't do trust. What happens then?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Zuko, sweetie...


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warning: FEELS

Zuko is pretty sure the Northern Water Tribe will have spices available. The entire journey through the city has been such an overpowering experience that it's impossible not to know how wealthy and powerful these people are. Here is a city to rival Zuko's former home. They might even have some turmeric. He's not going to make fire flakes without turmeric if he doesn't have to. It's just that no town they've stopped in has it available, and...

So Zuko has this _plan._ And he knows that if Uncle could hear it he'd poke a million holes in it, but Uncle isn't here, and he can't hear it, so Zuko is going to make some fire flakes, and he's going to sit with Sokka, and they're going to eat together, someplace private, and when Sokka gives up after, like, two flakes, Zuko is going to be smug and smooth and he'll say “It's okay, I'll finish them off for you,” and he'll take the bag back, and when their hands touch, he'll hold Sokka's hand, and he'll say “Sokka, I should have held onto you the moment I met you and never let go. I love you, and I want to be with you,” and then Sokka will kiss him, and it will be spicy and sweet and _completely perfect_ and then, while Zuko is fantasizing, maybe a _polardog_ will crawl out of his _asshole_ and teach him and Sokka how to dance a _Nomad Jig,_ because none of that is going to happen, Sokka is going to take one look at him and start laughing.

If he doesn't find any turmeric, he might scream. He just wants to get this over with.

They meet a small delegation at a boat ramp, and Zuko is barely paying enough attention to notice they are there until he sees... “Uncle?”

Uncle smiles and waves from underneath thick furs. Chief Hakoda is beside him, and beside them is an old, bald man with a sneering face and a tall, stern man maybe five years older than Chief Hakoda.

“Dad!” Sokka yells, running up from Appa's tail (when did he get on Appa's tail?) and hurrying up to hug his father. Katara joins him a moment later, and Zuko stays behind with Aang long enough to help him get Appa out of the water, then hurries to Uncle while Aang joins Sokka and Katara. 

At first, Zuko doesn't know what he wants to do, but then his body acts for him, and he is holding tight to Uncle. “I was afraid you'd been killed,” Zuko admits.

“It was a little touch and go for a while.” Uncle's voice emerges, muffled, from somewhere near Zuko's left shoulder. “The boat was so overloaded, we had to throw things overboard. We even threw away my favorite teapot. I am glad you are well, Prince Zuko.”

A million questions flit through Zuko's head. Things like _why was your favorite teapot on Hakoda's ship in the first place?_ and _did you come up here with the whole crew even though the ship was overloaded?_ and also the very erudite questions like _holy shit?_ and _AAAAAAAHHHHH!_ Instead of any of these, Zuko says “I need to ask you for some advice.”

Because Uncle is amazing, he doesn't hesitate. Sokka turns to look at him as Zuko and Uncle go off to talk, but Zuko just tosses him a smile and an awkward thumbs-up, and Sokka turns back to speaking with his father. Uncle takes Zuko down to a tea shop not far from their landing zone, because _of course he fucking does_ and sits him down in a chair in the most isolated corner. The walls are made of ice. At least the furniture isn't. “What did you need to ask me about?” Uncle says.

“Well, it's sort of a... soulmate thing,” Zuko says.

“Ah! You have fallen in love.” Uncle smiles broadly, reaching out to squeeze Zuko's right shoulder with a gentle hand. “Of course, Prince Zuko, you have my blessing. I have always felt that my grandfather's intolerance was a poison that weakened the Fire Nation. This was after that Jet boy... well, forgive me, but I have known for some time... after he broke your poor heart?”

“Jet did not _break my heart”_ ~~he totally did~~ “Uncle, I barely even knew him for a day. We kissed, like, once.” ~~Twenty three times, but who's counting?~~ Zuko reins in his temper. He is asking for advice, and as a supplicant, he shouldn't be so hot-headed. “I haven't told Sokka how I feel. You've... had... relationships. How do I do that?”

“Prince Zuko, he is your _soulmate._ You simply tell him and trust in him.”

Zuko peers around at the other tables. A couple of Water Tribe women are giving him a suspicious look. “I was going to make him some fire flakes and tell him then. Because... um, there was this town that was having a Fire Days Festival, and we didn't go in, but we talked about festivals, and I mentioned how you're pitifully weak and can't eat fire flakes” Uncle nods in sage agreement: this is established fact “and he said he wanted to try them, and I said I could make them, which is true because I know all the steps, and if anyone here has turmeric I'll have all the ingredients I need, and then I'll make him the fire flakes and we'll eat them together and I'll say 'Sokka, I should have held onto you the moment I met you and never let go. I love you, and I want to be with you,' and then he'll either kiss me or start laughing but at least it will all be done with.” Zuko remembers that he has to breathe a few seconds after he finishes talking.

There is a little cooing noise from Zuko's left, and he turns to find that the women from before have abandoned “suspicious” in favor of “hanging on the drama.”

Perfect. More people to watch Zuko melting down. This is embarrassing enough when it's just Uncle there, or just Sokka.

“Prince Zuko—“

“Uncle, you haven't called me that in weeks,” Zuko says. “Why are you calling me Prince so much?”

Uncle frowns. “We will come to that. First, let us talk about this confession you want to make to Sokka. If you want to do this right, you must learn to make fire flakes. I have some turmeric. We will practice together.”

+

So, the plan is actually pretty cool. Uncle is totally convinced that Ozai is going to use the comet to do to the Earth Kingdom what Sozin did to the Air Nomads, or possibly find a way to do something even worse. 

That would suck.

Fortunately, like the cool guy he is, Uncle has a counter, and amazingly, it results in Sokka's soulmate becoming Fire Lord. Of course, it also means Aang has eight months to master water, earth, and fire and get ready to have his showdown with Ozai. 

He also has to learn to control the Avatar State, get ready to help guide the world into peace, and probably pull off a trillion miracles every day. Aang is sitting down, letting Katara soothe him. Sokka is pretty sure he checked out of the conversation about the third time someone said the words “kill Ozai,” but he's not about to bring that up. Not here.

Zuko looks pretty distraught, too. Clearly, it is time for Sokka to go work his soulmate magic. There's a few hours before this dinner party Chief Arnook wants to throw for them, and Zuko's been out with Uncle most of the day, probably hearing about this plan, and...

Well, it doesn't take a genius to figure out that this plan probably terrifies Zuko. Sokka has noticed that under the cool, collected competence, Zuko feels unworthy and insecure at least as much as Aang does (and holy shit, Aang has some issues).

“Hey, Jerkbender. C'mon.” Sokka grabs his soulmate by the hand and drags him out of the little meeting room. He and Zuko have been given their own room in the palace (and that's a weird fuckin' sentence), so that's where he takes Zuko. As soon as they get into the room, Zuko relaxes just a little, then tenses again, then relaxes, then tenses, over and over about a half-dozen times. Sokka watches Zuko's face dart through confusion, determination, defiance, realization, anger, sadness, and determination again. It's fascinating. ~~It's mesmerizing.~~

“I was going to talk to you about something,” Zuko says after he settles on determination. “But this plan changes everything. I... Sokka, if I'm going to be good enough to be Fire Lord—“

Nope. None of that. Sokka cuts him off and grabs his hands, which are clenched into fists at his side. “Zuko, you stupid motherfucker, you're already good enough to be Fire Lord.”

Even as Sokka works Zuko's clenched fists open, he is sputtering disagreements, but Sokka soothes them away until something _coherent_ comes out of Zuko's mouth. “But there's so much I have to do! I have to learn diplomacy, and I have to figure out how to get my people's loyalty, and I have to... oh fuck, Sokka, they're gonna make me choose a _queen!”_

“You could always fake your own death and live out your days here in the Northern Water Tribe.”

“I'd rather go be an Earth Kingdom peasant, it's warmer there.” Zuko probably does not mean to sound so much like he's already thought about that. But Sokka saw the drawings in Zuko's desk, a few months and also several eons ago. Those later sketches, all those girls, Fire Nation, Earth Kingdom, Water Tribe, all in quietly domestic settings. 

“Tell you what,” Sokka says, “we'll get a nice little cabin on the southern coast, and when you're not Fire Lording, we'll go there and get away from it all.”

“Yeah,” Zuko says darkly. “You, me, and the _queen.”_

“No, you and me.” Sokka pulls Zuko's hands up to his chest, then pulls him closer, wraps his arms around Zuko's slim, tense body. “And we'll discuss this 'queen' business later. But I am not giving up my time with you, and if that means I have to sneak you away from a bunch of palace guards to a secret hidden soulmate cabin, I will do it. I mean it, Jerkbender.” ~~This is begi~~ nning to sound like Sokka loves Zuko the way that Aang loves Katara, the way that Dad loves Bato, ~~the way that Uncle loved Aunt Wu (aw fuck why?)~~ and yeah, that fucking makes sense, doesn't it, if he can ju ~~st stop and thi~~ nk about what he wants for a minute.

Zuko squirms in Sokka's arms. It reminds him of that time with Suki out on the deck of t ~~he _Snapdragon,_ when she had him pinned, but that's not imp~~ortant right now. “Sokka, it can't be—“

“Pigbullshit,” Sokka interrupts. Zuko stills. Spirits, but he's beautiful.

“Sokka, it can't. It can't be that because I... I'm not strong enough... I... Sokka, I'm not good enough for you to...” he ducks his head down, resting his forehead against Sokka's chest. Sokka lets him take his time. After about a minute of silence, Aang and Katara come around the corner, looking concerned. Sokka shoots his sister a Look, and she retreats silently with Aang. Katara is a great sister, ~~because fuck, does she know how to take a hint when it really matters,~~ and what really matters right now is Zuko. Another few minutes pass, and finally, Zuko says “I can't control myself. If we're alone like that, all the time...”

Sokka nearly pushes him out to arm length. He stops himself, realizing that Zuko might take it as a rejection. Instead, he interrupts him by reaching up to cup the sides of Zuko's face and tilt his head up.

He has inspected Zuko's face this closely before. The eerie congruence of their scars. The way his hair has grown out, which is becoming an interestingly shaggy counterpart to Katara's carefully-tamed mane. Zuko hasn't stopped itching yet: Sokka has seen him scratching sometimes ~~when he believes no one is watching, or~~ when it's just the two of them. Zuko's face is vulnerable, surprised. His eyes flick to Sokka's and for a moment, Zuko's eyes are his entire world, the right wide and the left a perfect match for Sokka's own. Sokka's eyes dip to Zuko's lips, they roam the strong lines of his jaw, they flit across the landscape of Zuko, with which he has become familiar, and he's seen all of it, even hurting and confused like this, but this time it's different because this time _he is deeply, desperately in love with Zuko_

“Zuko, look at me. I... when we were first coming into the city, I saw... I saw this beautiful girl, and I was just... totally blown away. I wanted to jump off of Appa and go introduce myself, and then I thought that I should just wait and see if she showed up again—no, don't make that face, listen to me—because I didn't want to talk to her _without you there._ Zuko, I only know two things for sure about the future, and those are that I'm gonna be with you and you're gonna be with me. Always. Okay? And no queen, no girl, no crazy hot terrorist boy, no evil Fire Lord, no war, nothing is going to get between you and me ever again.”

Zuko's good eye is swimming in unshed tears. Sokka leans in to kiss them away, and Zuko barely breathes when Sokka slowly, slowly trails his kisses to his lips, and Zuko's arms steal around his waist. 

Yeah, they'll have to solve a whole lot of Fire Lord problems, but right now, there's just this. The kiss lasts for a long, long while, and when it ends, Zuko is still crying, but he's also smiling. “I... um... we should...”

Sokka shushes him and kisses him one more time.

Katara is an amazing sister, and will therefore stay away until Sokka comes to get her. Sokka wants to pull Zuko to his bed, and he's not sure whose eyes flick that way first, but soon enough they both look at once, and both turn back to the other at once, and Sokka says “Zuko, I really... really want to.”

“I know,” Zuko says, a little breathless. “Me too.”

“We need to talk about this,” Sokka says. “We need to, because it's gotta be okay for you, Zuko. Don't put me first on this.”

Zuko closes his eyes. “Okay, yeah. Talk. But if we run out of time—“

“Oh, this is not the last chance we are getting,” Sokka says, and he sits down on the bed.

+

Yue isn't surprised to see the strangers at the banquet. Seeing strangers followed by a banquet being called isn't a high-level logic puzzle. They're a strange bunch, the Avatar, the Fire Prince, and the children of Chief Hakoda, coming in a few days after the chief and his strange turncoat adviser. The Avatar and the chief's daughter are soulmates, their bond visible in their every interaction, excitedly talking about waterbending. The chief's son, on the other hand... he is soulmates with the Fire Prince. They are also both rumpled and sheepish, more obviously in love than anyone Yue has met in a long time. She tears her eyes away from them.

Father finishes his speech, and then the performers start. Yue jumps at a voice beside her. “Hi. Um. I'm Zuko.”

“Yue,” she says. Beyond Zuko, his soulmate leans forward to look at her.

“Hi Yue! I'm Sokka.”

Yue laughs despite herself. This boy is cute. “When did you two meet?” she asks.

“About three months ago, maybe six hours after Aang and Katara met,” Sokka says.

“Really?” Yue blinks. “You're so cute and shy with each other, I thought it must be a week or two.”

“No,” Zuko rubs his left wrist. “Eleven weeks, two days,” he says. He looks down at the table, and from his right, Sokka reaches out and takes Zuko's left hand with his own left. 

“We had kind of a rough start because it would have been much more convenient for him if I were dead or never existed,”

“Sokka,” Zuko groans, blushing.

“but he understands me, and I'm _very_ in love with him.”

“Aah! Ah! I knew it!” Sokka's sister yells. “You've been all gooey with each other since Jet!”

“We have not,” Sokka and Zuko object together. They look at each other and blush, and oh no, Yue is going to be physically ill from how sweet they are.

“You totally have." The girl looks petulant, just like Yue would expect of a younger sister. "Sokka, why didn't you tell me you were together?”

“We weren't?” Sokka says.

“You were a little,” the Avatar says.

“I have known Zuko is in love with Sokka since Six Piers Burning,” General Iroh says.

“I saw it when I met Zuko,” Chief Hakoda says.

“Me too,” Sokka's sister says.

“Katara, we got into a fistfight with each other that was so bad we both got knocked out,” Sokka complains, and Zuko deftly adds “because we are stupid and Sokka is especially stupid because he's the one who knocked us out.”

Katara rolls her eyes. “And you were in love or you would have kicked the sh...ooh... the shoes out of him and sabotaged his ship so hard it exploded. He can't take you in a fight.”

“He's a bender!” Sokka objects, but Zuko laughs.

“Sokka, the only way you can't beat me is if I have swords and you don't. You're really good.” Zuko kisses his cheek. He freezes halfway through the motion, shrugs so slightly Yue is barely sure she sees it, and relinquishes Sokka's hand.


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> okay here comes some Aangst.

Katara's older brother is an idiot. So is his stupid future-Fire-Lord soulmate. Aang is totally convinced that they must have actually talked about all their issues, but Katara is pretty sure it went more like Zuko-gets-sad, Sokka-comforts-Zuko, Sokka-and-Zuko-kiss, jerkbending.

She is absolutely certain they haven't talked about this whole... Princess Yue thing. Zuko clearly isn't _into_ girls, and Sokka is going to break his poor, stupid, angry little heart.

Not that it seems to be going poorly so far. Zuko is attending all his lessons with Master Pakku, who has finally stopped treating Katara like she doesn't deserve to learn bending (that might have something to do with the scowling Uncle Iroh in attendance at lessons), and all of their lessons on healing, which in turn seem to have helped him with his firebending, if Uncle Iroh's pleased expression when they train together is anything to go by, or the fact that she swears they were tossing around _multicolored_ flames the other day. Meanwhile, Sokka and Yue have been spending their days hanging out with each other. To hear Sokka tell it, they're also avoiding Yue's fiance, who may or may not be a huge dickhead who is convinced Sokka, Zuko, and Uncle Iroh are all planning the downfall of the Northern Water Tribe. At the end of lessons, Sokka and Yue show up, and Yue always delivers a sweet little peck to Zuko's cheek, and Sokka kisses him enthusiastically and the three of them spend more time together. 

Okay, so Katara might also be a little jealous of Princess Yue. That is not her fault. Her brother used to have time for her, and it's weird that he doesn't anymore.

But she is learning a lot. Even if Master Pakku is kind of a jerk who has to be bullied into not being sexist.

And really, it's great bonding time for her and Aang, and for her and Zuko, but...

“I miss you, Sokka,” she blurts at lunch about a week after they arrive. They're all together for lunch, and Yue is out taking care of some official spiritual thing with the high priestesses, so it's just the four of them.

Sokka stops in the middle of eating a crab-spider leg. There is white crab-flesh hanging out of his mouth. Aang's seaweed medley freezes on the way to his own mouth as he watches. Zuko calmly reaches over to help Sokka disentangle himself from his food. After ten agonizing seconds of mostly-silent chewing and a hard swallow, Sokka says “but I'm right here, Katara,” which is _so_ not the point.

“Not most of the time,” Katara says. “You and Yue are always hanging out together. You don't even watch us training. And then when you come back, you drag poor Zuko off—” 

“Katara, he's not dragging me anywhere,” Zuko says. “We're trying to help her. Yue's situation is... a little weird. Her soulmate is the moon.”

“The... moon?” Aang looks across the table at them, from puzzled Katara to reassuring Zuko to mildly-annoyed Sokka, and it occurs to Katara that she might have done better to ask Sokka what's going on.

“Yeah, Aang, the moon,” Sokka says. “Yue was very sick when she was born, so her parents took her to the spirit oasis,” Sokka points a thumb in the general direction of the city outskirts, “and they bonded her to the moon spirit to save her life. It worked, but now she's permanently stuck that way and has some kind of big destiny thing with the moon because 'debts must always be repaid' or some stupid stuff like that. Of course, that didn't stop Chief Arnook from arranging a totally political marriage for her to an arrogant jerk, which she doesn't deserve because she's” Sokka's face goes very soft “beautiful and sweet and kind and beautiful and smart—”

“Sokka, you're gushing,” Zuko points out kindly, then turns to Katara with a smile. “He's a little infatuated, and Uncle is pretty sure the best solution is... um... possibly for her to get engaged to me, instead?” Zuko blushes.

“It's a good plan. Basically, when Zuko takes over as Fire Lord, he gets me as his husband, and he would get Yue as like... an insurance-consort to reassure the Northern Tribe.” Sokka shrugs.

“But she'd be more like a girlfriend for you, Sokka,” Katara says.

Zuko nods. “Yes, she would. That's allowed. Uncle says there have been Fire Lords in the past who preferred... who were... Fire Lords like me. And they had consorts, or sometimes wives. The line of succession has gone through the children of the Fire Lord's spouse and consort a few times. It doesn't really matter as long as there's an heir that everyone accepts.”

Katara glares at Sokka, but still addresses Zuko. “And you're okay with him... having a girlfriend?”

“Yeah. We've talked that over. A lot, actually, since he noticed how he was about Yue.” Zuko eats another bite of fish before he adds, “and Yue is great. I mean, I am definitely disappointing my father in every way I can find because I am not at all interested in her that way, but she's got a lot of... fire.” he grins at the word. “She'd be great as a consort, and as an adviser.” Zuko thinks for a moment, then adds, “And if she and Sokka ever had kids, they would make the prettiest babies.”

“They would be really pretty babies,” Aang agrees. “It sounds like they're talking this stuff out, Katara. You can talk to me if you need help, guys. I don't know a lot about it, but some of the monks had trio marriages, and I know a few Air Nomad traditions that might help.”

“The point is,” Sokka says, “the Fire Nation isn't very likely to accept a Fire Lord who doesn't have any bloodline heirs, but the soulmate's bloodline is closer than a couple of other heirs have been. It's a good idea politically, it gives Yue power in the Fire Nation as well as the Water Tribes, it helps with diplomacy, and Yue isn't... you know... dreading it. And she thinks I'm cute.”

“She thinks we're both cute,” Zuko says. “She also thinks Aang is cute, but more like kid cute than grown-up cute.”

Everyone thinks Aang is cute. This is not news to Katara.

“Everyone thinks Aang is cute,” Sokka says. “Aang is like a turtleduck that can kick your ass.”

Aang blushes and pays very close attention to his meal.

“I think he's just a turtleduck,” Katara says. Aang brightens at that. Sometimes, Sokka can be really insensitive, and calling a pacifist an asskicker is just one more example.

But he's trying. He thought that was a compliment. Probably.

“Just be careful, you two,” Katara urges.

+

It's not just about holding the water at some kind of magic healing temperature. If that was the only thing about it, Aang would have this down. He bent a cup of tea to the perfect temperature for Uncle Iroh the other day (when he was busy promising that he and Zuko would teach Aang firebending at the proper time, _after_ he learns earthbending), so it's not that. Zuko is amazing at it. He's better than _Katara,_ and almost as good at fighting with water. Aang is just...

Monk Gyatso always said that Aang is a fidgeter, an innovator, an artist. He can do novel things with bending, like how he surprised Pakku (Pakku is a sexist jerk and doesn't get called Master until he starts being nicer to Katara and giving lessons to _all_ the girls because Sokka is still mad at him, and Aang is very loyal) with that move that was basically just an air scooter made of water, or the cloudbending, or that trick with the fish that Sokka gave him a high five for and Pakku said was obscene.

None of that translates well to healing, which is taught by a kindly old woman named Yugoda who seems to have trouble deciding whether it's weirder that she's teaching the Avatar, a firebender, or two boys in general. She leans over and corrects Aang's hand position, then frowns. 

“Aang, you must take hold of the energy within the body,” she says. “Your patient's chi will take hold of your own and work with it, but only once you have gathered it up. An injury disrupts the flow. This is why an injury can be healed this way.”

Zuko reaches out from the other side of the practice dummy. “Master Yugoda, may I?” he says.

Master Yugoda nods. Zuko takes Aang's hand and lifts it up to his face, cupping it over the scar on his left eye. “Try to heal here, and then try to heal below, on my jaw. Feel the difference.”

Aang frowns.

On the dummy, chi feels like big, wide lines of energy. Zuko's burn feels like a tangle in Appa's fur. It tries to drag the temperature of his water up and down, to tear it all out of his hand. It's easy enough to fight that, and to try to untangle it, but it utterly refuses to yield. He moves his hand down, and here, Zuko's chi feels like well-groomed fur, or maybe like a stream of water, hot and cold and flowing smoothly under his hand. It almost feels like he could bend Zuko's chi if he wanted to, reshape him, make him a different sort of bender or a non-bender, or dig deep and bend his conn ~~ection to Sokka, but that thought takes him to a dangerous place.~~

“I feel it,” Aang says, “but it flows like water. How am I supposed to hold it all?”

“Bend it like water,” Zuko says.

Yugoda nods. “In my research, I've learned that the Avatars who have been the greatest healers were either waterbenders to begin with or firebenders. Perhaps, in some time, when you have mastered fire, it will come more easily to you, but for now, you must learn as you learn water.” She looks up. “Yes?”

“The Fire Nation is coming,” Sokka says before Aang has even turned to look. By the time he does turn, Sokka and Yue are standing in the door together, looking terrified. Black flecks of soot stain Yue's hair. If it wasn't so ominous, it would look pretty cool. “We need all the benders ready for battle.”

For a moment, Aang's heart soars. He's done with this confusing lesson! Then the rest of it sinks in. Battle. There's going to be a fight.

Oh.

_Oh._

_Oh no._

Aang feels himself starting to tremble a little. Fights happen, of course they happen, there's a war going on and no one trying to stop it is ever going to avoid every fight, but he hasn't had a warning about a fight this far in advance ~~he should just run away like he did a hundred years ago~~ and somehow that makes it a lot worse, and Katara is asking how many ships there are and Sokka is saying that it's a whole fleet and Aang has never even _seen_ a whole fleet ~~Appa is out there, he can see him just behind Sokka and Yue~~ what is he even supposed to do against a whole fleet

Katara wraps Aang in a hug, her hands coming around to press him close to her, crossed over his chest. “You're not alone. You can do this,” she says into his right ear, soft and gentle.

_I'm not alone. I can do this._

Sokka and Yue lead Aang, Katara, and Zuko to the war room. 

This is going to be dangerous. Zuko reaches out to Sokka and squeezes his hand, and Yue surprises Aang by leaving Sokka's side to grip Zuko's other hand. The three talk quickly back and forth. Aang rubs a palm over Appa's nose as they pass.

“Hey, buddy,” Aang says.

Appa lets out a little groan. Momo climbs down from somewhere on top of him and clambers onto Aang's shoulder, tiny little lemur-hands petting across Aang's head. 

“I'm not alone. I can do this,” Aang says.

Distantly, he can hear the waterbending masters thickening the city walls. Uncle Iroh meets them outside of the palace and hurries them to a strategy meeting. Aang goes where he is told.

Like most complicated political and strategy talk, what they talk about goes in one ear and directly out the other. Sometimes, the inside of Aang's head feels like the Room of Whispers at the Eastern Air Temple, with a million noises bouncing around and none of them clear. It's so much easier when someone tells him what he's supposed to _do,_ and he almost collapses with relief when, after an hour and a half of _really complicated_ strategy talk, Sokka turns to him. Sokka always boils it down to what Aang needs to do.

Sokka is pretty cool like that.

_I'm not alone. I can do this._

“Aang, your first job is going to be to go out and disable some ships. You don't have to hurt anyone, just make it so the ships can't hurt us.”

“Cool,” Aang says. “Who am I taking with me?”

They exchange uncomfortable looks. Aang's stomach begins to churn and roil a little. Then Zuko steps forward. “I'll be on Appa with you.”

“Zuko, no,” Hakoda says.

“Look at him, he's terrified!” Zuko objects. “I'll help.”

Sokka's face goes from hard and determined to embarrassingly sappy in no time flat. “I love you so much,” he says.

“Prince Zuko, you are one of the people we're trying to _protect,”_ Chief Arnook growls. 

“I'm also a firebender and a trained soldier,” Zuko says. “I can protect Aang, and he can protect me. And it makes more sense to send me than anyone else. If we keep Katara and Sokka with Master Yugoda, she'll be able to heal any injuries they get from us getting hurt.”

Everyone in the war room pauses at that. 

“Huh,” Uncle Iroh says. “I had not thought of that.”

“Zuko, I love you _so fucking much,_ you insane genius,” Sokka says.

“Okay, new plan,” Chief Arnook says. He frowns, points at Zuko, and says with a shrug “that plan, specifically.”

“What?” says a young voice. They all turn to look. It's Yue's (ex? Have they talked about that with the chief yet?) fiance, Tahn or Kahn or Lahn or something. His extremely square jaw is set even more than usual with anger. “We can't send the Avatar out alone with a firebender! Send me instead!”

“No, Hahn,” Chief Arnook says. "They're right.”

“You can't trust them!” Hahn yells.

“I trust him,” Aang says. The others in the room all look at each other, and the rest of Hahn's objections are quashed. The meeting finishes a few minutes later, and Uncle Iroh walks Aang and Zuko out to Appa.

“This will be a difficult task for you, Aang,” Uncle Iroh says. “You are a pacifist, and I admire that, but you may have to compromise on your values in order to stay safe and protect your friends. I cannot promise that you will not have to make that sacrifice, but remember that if you do, the people who love you will be there for you afterward. Sometimes, we have no choice but to fall down, but we do not have to get up on our own. You are not alone.”

Aang hugs him tightly. “Thank you, Uncle,” he mutters into his belly.

Uncle pats his head, and then Appa nudges him. Aang climbs on top of Appa's head and calls “yip yip!” to get him airborne.

From above, the city looks a lot more fragile than it seems down on the ground. There's a little spot in the ice cliffs at the top of two staircases behind them that must be the spirit oasis, and all the ice and snow and water between here and there looks... well, a lot more like _just_ ice and snow and water. It's a sadly swift journey out of the city and over the ocean. Zuko is silent behind him for a few minutes. At first, Aang thinks he must be annoyed at having to protect him, then he thinks that maybe Zuko is just trying to seem cool or strong, and then Zuko rests a hand on his left shoulder, then one on his right, and sits behind him.

“Aang, you're trembling,” Zuko says.

Huh. So he is. Interesting.

Zuko wraps his arms around Aang from behind, not _quite_ like Katara does it, but close enough. “You're not alone. We can do this,” Zuko says.

The fleet comes into view. Zuko swallows hard. “We can do this?” Aang says.

Zuko nods. “We can do this. They're using an Azulon's Block formation. We can do some damage if we hit the big ship...” he points. Aang mourns the loss of that arm around his chest. “There. They've got a signalman up on their watchdeck. See him?” A plume of fire comes up over the ship. Aang nods. “The formation is too big for all the ships to see each other, so he's helping coordinate. Drop me up there, and then go down and hit their catapults. We'll meet up on the afterdeck.”

Aang sucks in as deep of a breath as he can hold. Zuko lets go of him and gets ready to jump down. “We should have brought Momo and a knife,” he says.

Aang chuckles, and then the battle is on.


	15. Chapter 15

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so... blanket trigger warning for violence across this whole chapter. We _start_ with Azula speculating on some pretty extreme violence and then go from there. Most of the really graphic stuff is in Azula's scene up front, but I can make no guarantees about your comfort level. Additionally, there's... a lot of attempted fratricide in this chapter. Just... so ya know.

Thirty one ships. More than two _hundred_ catapults. And not a single death.

Zuzu is _toying_ with her.

Well, that won't last. It's pretty impressive for a day's work, but it's not going to be enough, because now the fleet is in position. Admiral Kebab (that mostly-useless idiot) is terrible at tactics, but he _is_ pretty good at strategy, and all Azula really needs to do is get him into position and then he'll pull off his ridiculous spirit-world bullshit and the Northern waterbenders will be useless. Unless he's wrong, in which case he'll have outlived his usefulness and she'll burn him so badly his skull pops. She's heard about that happening in some of the tales soldiers tell. They usually sound horrified. It seems like it would be interesting to see.

So she pulls the remaining ships up broadside and has them open fire.

About a tenth of their shots fall short or overshoot. The artillery supervisors will give her the names of the operators who missed, and they'll all regret their incompetence. Another eighth or so of the remainder are deflected by benders on the city walls.

The opening volley is the sort of crushing blow that levels towns so you can move on. The three quarters or so that gets through is still hundreds of shots, all blasting furiously into the enormous walls. They take the blow, but the catapults are reloading, and even as the waterbenders work to bring the walls back up, the first shot of the second volley arcs over, followed by the next, and the next, and the next and the next and the next after that, a cloud of fire and pitch and stone that collapses their efforts all along the wall. 

Azula's ships are firing at will, and as they rapidly lose synchronization with each other, the assault becomes less and less predictable, the enemy has fewer and fewer moments to rest. Some shots start to creep upwards, harrying the benders themselves, but never quite skimming the tops of the walls.

Azula has a weapon for that, but it's not time yet. The sun is starting to go down. It won't be long. Admiral Kebab's strategy has one great point: he wants to let up at night, when firebenders lack the advantage, when the moon will give the Water Tribe power. This is because he's insufficiently diabolical. If Father has taught her anything, it's that the most successful strategies are the ones that shock and dismay her enemies. It works on the Earth Kingdom (look at how Omashu went down), and it works on the Fire Nation (no political opponent lasts long against her, and that's for a very good reason), and it even works on her allies at home (Mai and Ty Lee will be even more inclined to do what she says after they hear about this), and there is no reason to think it won't work against the Water Tribe.

So the battering continues as the sun drops down, and Azula gives the first signal, a pillar of blue fire, when the waterbenders start pushing back against the catapults. Her fleet has smashed nearly halfway through the wall, but now it's growing faster than they can break it. The catapults loft their shots over, into the city itself. Fire and death rains down, but more importantly, the glow from the passing shots picks out every single waterbender on the wall.

Azula flashes blue light.

Next to her, the Yuyan Archers draw their bows.

An arrow whistles past her.

Oh, but she wishes she could ride that arrow. The wind rushing by, the freedom of flight, the thrill of seeing a target, the look of surprise, and the shaft exploding into an unprotected chest. These aren't ordinary archers who put their arrows downrange and hope something dies. She turns, and her archer smiles. He's killed a waterbender. He nocks, aims, breathes, and releases. Another smile. Azula smiles back at him. ~~Maybe this will impress Father.~~

Azula walks around behind the archer to manage fleet business. The Northern Water Tribe won't be a problem for the Fire Nation for very long. The _Bloody Lotus_ is standing by to help her chase the Avatar if he ~~does the smart thing and~~ flees like a coward. This is a day that the Fire Nation will talk about for centuries.

“Admiral Kebab!” she calls out as she comes to the bridge. It's _really_ funny the way he _twitches_ when she calls him that. “If they're going to try a water level assault, it's going to be now.”

“I still doubt,” he begins, but she silences him with a dark stare. “Yes, Lady Azula. I'll send my teams.”

“Helmets off,” Azula reminds him. “I won't let intruders infiltrate my ships.”

Admiral Kebab grumbles as he walks away, and Azula spends three hours watching the fleet's progress.

Kebab's teams stop nineteen boats. There are eleven successful attacks against the fleet, warriors sneaking up and performing some sabotage or another. One attempt is foiled personally by Kebab, who complains that the attacker called him “Choi.”

“That's ridiculous,” Azula says with a smile. “Your name is Kebab.”

He glares at her. She cackles. It's very unladylike ~~and that's why she does it so much.~~ “Go get some sleep, Kebab. We won't get through until tomorrow.”

+

It's not even noon when the fleet breaks through the walls. Aang is in the spirit oasis, and Katara and Yue are with him, so it's Sokka who stands next to Zuko when the first breach appears.

“My sister is going to come after me,” Zuko says, because blue fire is pretty distinctive and there was a lot of it last night. 

“I know,” Sokka says, because, presumably, he has no doubt that someone with the focus and foresight to bring the Yuyan Archers to deal with benders will have a plan that includes taking down the Avatar and his friends.

The Northern Water Tribe had one hundred and nineteen fighting waterbenders yesterday. Today they have fifty one. Azula is a monster. Every waterbender that has showed up on the wall has been forced to spend more effort blocking arrows than fixing the wall. The efforts to shore up the wall by building inwards instead of out have been... not enough. The catastrophic loss of life inside the walls when the catapults started hitting the city, the abrupt deaths of almost seventy of the Water Tribe's most powerful fighters, the horrible truth of the infiltrators' failure to return... this is war. This is war as the Fire Nation conducts it. This is war as _Azula_ conducts it.

Uncle approaches from the left, coming up the stairs that lead to the spirit oasis.

“Prince Zuko. Sokka. I am going to add my protection to the spirit oasis. Take care of yourselves.” Uncle hugs Zuko, then Sokka. They both mumble farewells as he hurries in the door behind them.

Sokka takes Zuko's hand. He's shaking, too. Tanks are advancing up the streets. Here, the waterbenders have an advantage over the Yuyan Archers, and Azula's arrow assault is blunted, slowing the whole operation, but it's not enough.

The Water Tribe is going to lose this fight.

“How can we help?” Sokka asks.

Zuko closes his eyes. “Give me the water,” he says.

He feels the rush of cold that comes with Sokka trading out his flames for waterbending. Zuko's chi runs differently, a torrent instead of a conflagration, a trickle in place of a flicker. He reaches out with it, takes hold of the icy stairs. His hands slide down to the left, down to his right, smoothing the stairs. He twists, dragging the ice behind him over the door. No one is getting in there quickly. He turns back again to the battle, peels the ice below and in front of him, and forms a wall.

An arrow slams into his wall even as he is putting it up. It slides through the hole it has made, but its feathers catch on the ice. Although it is slowed, it still comes through, and strikes Zuko directly on the forehead. Pain blooms around it, and blood trickles down his face, but he closes the hole and adds another few layers just to be sure. “We defend the spirit oasis and Aang until he figures out how to stop them,” Zuko tells his soulmate. “The only thing that will happen if we go down there is that we'll die. I trust Uncle. If he says this all comes down to the spirits, then he's right. The rest of the fight is just them getting here.” He reaches out for the center of his wall, and he smoothly slides his chi over it. This kind of precision still takes focus, although he's getting pretty good at most waterbending. He makes a window. A few arrows smack into it, pointing ominously at him and Sokka when they finish vibrating where they've stuck in the ice.

The fight drags on.

The Northern Water Tribe is fierce. Azula is being cautious. Her forces are establishing a foothold. Zuko watches the battle through his window. Something is wrong. Streamers and whips of fire bite into buildings and streets and human bodies just inside the wall. Cascades of water smash tanks, and flipped tanks roll onwards after brief pauses. It all seems so much like the invasion Zuko once dreamed of redeeming himself with, except that he is now in the unenviable position of staring helplessly from the defenders' place as the orange glow of flames begins to consume the city.

_The orange glow of flames. Where is Azula?_

“Sokka, can you see her?” Zuko asks.

“Azula?” Sokka starts darting his head around, looking for her.

Fuck.

There are no blue flames, and no blue flames, and no blue flames _anywhere,_ for hours. The Fire Nation slowly expands its foothold, using only a fraction of what it can bring to bear because Azula is a capable strategist and she knows how to fight this fight, but Zuko knows his sister, and she should be on the front lines. Except that she's not.

She's up to something.

Noon brings no sign of her, and no lull in the fighting. He and Sokka share a meal of dry rations and water in cups Zuko bends out of the ice.

In the afternoon, the Fire Nation foothold is partially collapsed on the right flank by a focused assault. Zuko watches while Master Pakku makes a glorious fifteen-minute strike at the heart of Fire Nation command. 

Azula doesn't come out to fight him. He is repelled by twenty firebenders working in tandem.

The shadows deepen. The walls' shadows are so cold that a thin film of ice begins to form in the water beneath them.

The Fire Nation's hold expands rapidly again after Master Pakku is thrown back. The dying of the light drops shadows _even over the canals._

Ah. That's her plan.

The sun will be up for another thirty minutes when Zuko spots Azula at the bottom of the staircase on the right. 

The _ramp_ on the right.

Like that's going to stop her.

“Um, Zuko,” Sokka says behind him, “I think I found Zhao.”

“Other staircase?” Zuko guesses.

Sokka nods. 

Zuko reaches out, and he _pulls_ on the ice cliff. Sokka laughs, slightly hysterical. “You knocked a couple of his guys off.”

Zuko nods. Azula is about to turn to see him. He pulls on the ice again, putting a wall between them.

And he can feel that wall being burned away below.

“They're coming up.” Zuko melts the ice over the door and opens it. Uncle is waiting inside the icy passage that leads to the spirit oasis, just at the end where it opens out into the cavern Zuko recalls from maps and strategy meetings. He catches a glimpse of green, and maybe of the glow from Aang's Avatar State. 

“Uncle,” Zuko says, “Azula is coming. Zhao is, too.”

“I will need your help to fight them,” Uncle says.

“I know.” Zuko refreezes the door, and for the first time in hours, he lets himself touch Sokka. Warmth flows back into him. He kisses Sokka to revel in the feeling, then he turns back to Uncle. “Azula is going to go after me first. I can hold her back for a while. You use the distraction to take out Zhao as fast as you can.”

Uncle nods. It's a good plan, and he knows it. He'll take down Zhao faster than he could take down Azula, and faster than Zuko could take down Zhao, and definitely faster than Zuko can take down Azula _and_ faster than Azula can take down Zuko, so it will be Zuko and Uncle against Azula as fast as possible with no distractions, hopefully even if they've brought more benders. It would take a fucking lot to bring down Uncle.

Zuko feels the sun go down a few minutes before the door swings open. Azula stands there, and her eyes go wide. “What, not going to stand behind your waterbender boyfriend?” she says snidely. “You've been letting him protect you this whole time, but I guess he's tired now. Don't worry. He won't get tired again.”

Zhao appears behind her, and then seven soldiers, each wearing a firebender's uniform.

Zuko steps forward. “Sokka, go help the others,” Zuko says.

“Yeah,” Sokka replies. “Got it.” He retreats, and Zuko steps forward. 

Zhao's men charge. Zuko strikes at them as the pass, but only catches one. He's keeping an eye on Azula. Zhao glares at him. “I'm going to feed your dirty little secret his own guts,” he says as he starts forward.

“No you're not,” Zuko replies. He lets Zhao go by unmolested. Azula grins.

“Your exile is over, Zuzu,” she says. “Did you know? I have orders to find you and end your exile. It's a pity you couldn't end it by coming home. All my other toys are broken.”

Zuko charges forward. He reaches for his flames, not the running chi of waterbending but the ever-ready smolder of fire, and he stokes it high into a flame, with the techniques he's learned from Uncle, and from Master Pakku, and from his total fucking shitshow of a life. He stokes it with anger, and with need—to protect Sokka, and to protect Uncle, and Yue, and Katara, and Aang, and Appa, and Momo, and this entire freezing cold fucking city—and he stokes it with love, too, because that's a fire, and he feels it just as much, love for his soulmate and his family, not the twisted wreck of his sister (he loves her with a pity that doesn't burn so much as weep) or the looming monster of his father (he does not ~~think that he could ever~~ love that man) but instead he stokes it with the love for Uncle, and Katara, and Aang, and even Hakoda, who he's really started to like, and he pushes the screaming inferno out behind him and Azula is surprised in the moments before he hits her.

They go backwards through the door.

Zuko's wall was never meant to hold up to an impact from behind, and it doesn't, dropping down past the facade of the temple and the palace and plunging them both into water so cold it would kill anyone but a firebender in seconds.

They come up spluttering. Azula struggles for a moment, but Zuko knows water, he knows it like an old friend by now. He reaches the side of the canal a few seconds before Azula, and he is getting to his feet when a sheet of azure fire forces him to roll backwards. Azula covers her emergence with waves of fire, and she is waterlogged and _steaming_ as she glares at him, clutching her chest for just an instant. 

Zuko throws fire, and they match wills and powers. 

Azula is stronger. Zuko steps to the side to avoid the rush of her fire as she presses the attack. Her flames are strong, and too stubborn for him to grasp easily, but he has been working, he has been training, he has known for months that _he will have to fight firebenders_ and he turns and pushes _so_ and pulls _thus_ and Azula's deadly attack slips around him and spreads into a cloud of fire. He shoots back, streamers and gushes of fire that she bats aside like cobwebs as she advances, because ~~she is too strong, she is too good, and he can't beat her,~~ not that he needs to beat her, he just needs to slow her down. 

Zuko throws his flames, almost gentle fire, at the icy, sand-strewn walkway beneath her. Ice melts, the sand atop it for grip sinks, and Azula sinks down, giving him a deeply offended look as she redirects some fire to boil away the water. It takes enough pressure off of him that he is able to redirect the stream up at her face. It's a waterbender's move, misdirection instead of direct assault.

Azula isn't hurt by it, but she does fall back. Zuko presses the momentum he has built, he swings whips of fire at her, he pushes her back, five feet, ten feet, and then she thrusts her hand forward and he is barely able to push her attack aside. 

He screams as blue fire burns open his left arm.

The pain begins where Azula's whip has seared into him, in a jagged uneven line, but from there it spreads, an infestation of agony that wraps around his whole arm. He doubles over and that's it, she approaches for the killing blow. “You never did get it through your head that _I'm the better bender,_ did you Zuzu?” she taunts. She steps up as he cradles her arm. “I'm going to have to finish what Father started.” She raises her right hand up, closing the distance between them.

Zuko's arm goes cold. The pain fades away.

He keeps shaking and gripping his arm. The symbol of pain draws Azula closer. 

The wound closes up.

Azula's hand touches Zuko, fits into the scar shaped like their father's palm.

“Goodbye, Zuko,” she says.

“Bye Azula,” Zuko says, and he _lunges,_ twists, slams his shoulder into her chest and slams his forearm into her side. He feels something _give_ inside of his sister's body and she gasps.

A wave of blue light pushes him back, and she stands, holding her side, clutching her chest, breathing hard. They stare at each other in the deepening night.

Master Pakku is running down the street towards them. 

Holy shit, this fight is actually _over._

The moon turns red. Master Pakku stumbles and falls to one knee. Azula smiles. She straightens up. “No more waterbenders,” she says, fighting pain, yes, but winning.

Fuck. This fight is not actually over.

Azula moves stiffly at first as Zuko retreats. The stiffness is slowly fading away, and what's worse, the sheer intensity of her flames is forcing him backwards. There's a little outbuilding attached to the palace, and Zuko runs for it, throwing flames at the ground behind him. As soon as he has built a curtain of steam, he breaks for the spirit oasis. 

By the time Azula sees where he's gone, she has to close the distance before she can attack. He pelts up the path Zhao carved, risking a fall, risking death; there is no waterbending, so there is no healing. He's risking death the whole time anyway. 

Azula's fire licks at his heels as he reaches the door. He slams it shut and runs.

In the oasis, Uncle is dueling with Zhao. Two firebenders are sprawled, unconscious or worse, on the ground. Two more are floating facedown in the water below the walkway to the grassy oasis itself. Sokka is keeping one off balance with his sword.

Zhao and his benders are trying to burn a bag that is lying on the floor, but he should only have two benders with him. He has four instead.

There was a team that infiltrated another way.

Zuko sprints, and the ground is icy under his feet when the door slams open behind him. Azula screams something, unhinged and terrifying. Zuko steps onto grass. He pounds a flaming fist into Zhao's back before the admiral notices he's arrived. Zhao stumbles forward into Uncle's next attack, and Zuko scoops up the bag.

There is a fish inside of it. Zuko dives for the pond in the center of the oasis. The water is warm, and achingly fresh. He pulls the bag off of the fish.

Katara gasps. 

For a moment, everything seems almost still. Zhao is clutching at his face, and when he looks up, he is burned. It's worse than Zuko's.

Zhao's men are staring at this new arrival. Azula is perched at the edge of the walkway, just out of the corridor.

She breaks the silence. “ZUKO!” she shrieks.

Uncle bursts into motion. Sokka sticks his astonished opponent through the shoulder, and the man drops just as Zuko grabs Sokka's hand. “Trade,” he snaps.

His blood runs cold.

His _chi_ runs cold.

Like a mountain stream.

He grips the ice Azula is crossing, and he melts it.

She plunges down.

He presses the water down on top of her until he can't tell where she is anymore.

And then, Aang stirs. He steps into the pond. 

The waters begin to rise.


	16. Chapter 16

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Last chapter of part 1!

The remains of the Fire Nation fleet aren't much prettier from overhead when he goes to check today than they were from the shore yesterday afternoon. The view from the shore had Aang more thoroughly melted down than Sokka ever wants to see again, without even the rage or fear that brings on the Avatar State. He'd just been a sputtering mess, and Sokka loves the little guy, so he turns Appa right back around and goes back to the palace to tell everyone they can't leave just yet.

When he lands, Yue and Zuko both take one look at his face and purse their lips in such similar expressions that Sokka has to fight not to laugh. Chief Arnook stands behind Yue, Dad stands behind Zuko with a hand on his shoulder, just like he does to Sokka all the time. Appa lands lightly, and Sokka hurries to kiss Zuko, then to wrap Yue up in a tight hug.

Uncle emerges from the palace sometime during the hug with Yue, probably after Zuko joins in, which narrows the time frame down to... well, when Sokka actually sees Uncle, he's almost to them, so it probably was about the time he first hugged her.

“We should give it another day,” Sokka says. “There's... a lot of death out there right now. Let's let the shark-squids do their thing.”

“We have to go tomorrow, though,” Zuko says.

Sokka nods. “Yeah. No matter what. Aang needs an earthbending teacher, and we're not going to find one here. Uncle, are you sure about Omashu?”

Uncle nods. “Yes. The city is lost to us for now. The soldiers we captured have told us that much. I will make for Ba Sing Se by the sea route, you will go by air. Do not forget to send me messages if you are delayed!”

Sokka nods. “Okay. Yeah. I guess you and Dad are still leaving tonight, then?”

Uncle nods. Dad nods as well, grim-faced. “Bato and Jee are getting the ship ready and the new crew will be there this afternoon.”

Sokka nods. “Okay then. Are Aang and Katara still napping?”

“I believe Aang is finally asleep,” Uncle says. “The nightmares seem to have stopped.”

“Because Katara is doing something freaky with magic water and exhausting herself,” Sokka surmises. “Okay. Let's go inside, then.” 

They all sort of generally head that way while the palace animal keeper comes for Appa. “So,” Sokka says, “Chief Arnook...”

The Northern chief fixes him with a dark look, but then he smiles, a thin expression that still makes Sokka feel... just a little better.

When they get into the temple, the priests and priestesses are there. Zuko groans. “We're really going to do this, aren't we?”

Sokka grins and toes off his shoes, daring a moment of sparkling eye contact. Zuko's eyes, unique among eyes in general, are a refuge. “Strip, Jerkbender.”

Zuko scoffs, but he strips, next to Sokka, until they're both standing naked in front of the priests and priestesses and royalty. 

The Southern Tribe does this with underwear on. Sokka isn't totally convinced they're not hazing him, but they step up onto the platform together so the Counting of the Scars can begin.

It takes a while. 

He and Zuko have sixty two scars between them, two identical sets of thirty one. The priestess who counts the last one steps back and announces that their match is perfect. “They are soulmates!” she declares to general, if muted, applause. When the noise dies down, she turns to Sokka. “You have known him for some time. Do you wish to speak to his character?”

Sokka nods. “Yes. Zuko is kind, and good, and brave, and honorable.” Zuko's face flushes slightly more than it already is from being naked in front of fifteen strangers.

The priestess turns next to Zuko. “And do you wish to speak to your soulmate's character?”

Zuko nods stiffly. “Sokka is good, and brave, and wise, and humble.”

The priestess smiles. “Do you wish, then, to seal your bond?”

Sokka reaches across the space between them to take Zuko's hand. “It is already sealed in love. I ask you to witness it, Priestess.”

“Then it is so witnessed,” she says. “You are, in the eyes of the spirits, so bonded and sealed. Let nothing come between you, let the world sing forever of your love. Closer than lovers, always at each other's sides. Are all here satisfied?”

There's a general chorus of agreement. Zuko pulls Sokka in close for a kiss. As they step down from the platform, Zuko speeds up to get to his pants. Sokka grins and takes the moment to look at his butt. He probably _could_ bounce stuff off of it.

“So remind me again what level of married we are now?” Zuko says. He pulls his pants on and immediately gets less red.

“Well, by Water Tribe custom, we're, like... super-engaged or maybe pre-married? It's more than a betrothal, but less than a marriage.” Zuko nods along while Sokka starts in on his own pants. “Yeah. I figure we'll get married for real when you're Fire Lord and you can make a bunch of dignitaries sit through five different wedding ceremonies.”

“Not all dignitaries deserve that,” Zuko says.

“No, they don't, but it's going to happen anyways,” Sokka says. He picks up his shirt in one hand and grabs Zuko with the other to pull him close and kiss him. “After all, I will do every single wedding ceremony I can find or think of with you.”

“You are such a dork,” Zuko says.

“You love it,” Sokka says.

They finish dressing in silence after Zuko concedes that yes, he does love it. When they're done, the clergy have all filed out. Uncle reaches into his pocket and hands Zuko something, and Sokka hurries to Dad to retrieve what he needs from him. They clutch their packages and approach Arnook.

Chief Arnook looks down at what they present him, and he nods.

Sokka turns on his heel and pushes Zuko forward.

“Princess Yue,” Zuko says, “I have nothing right now, but I will be Fire Lord one day.” He extends the golden brooch in his hand, shaped into a fine, detailed rendering of a flame. “On that day, I ask you to join me and my...” he smiles very softly at Sokka as he says “my husband to be as our queen consort.”

Yue grins. Sokka steps forward and offers his own gift. A betrothal necklace, with the sign of the flame inside the Water Tribe's symbol. “I ask you to join us as well.”

She takes both the brooch and the necklace with a broad grin, and with more calm in her voice than on her face, she says “I will.” She shuffles both gifts to one hand and retrieves two small glass flasks from a pocket. “Take these with you in return. The most sacred gift I can give you. Water from the spirit oasis. One for you, my loves, and one for Katara, when she wakes up. Use this for healing. It may even be able to bring you some relief for your burn scars.” Zuko takes the little phials and flashes her a grin.

Sokka pulls both of them into his arms, and if he cries a little, nobody but them has to know.

(Katara totally calls that he cried the next evening when they talk about it.)

(So does Aang.)

(Sokka doesn't mind.)

+

Aang isn't called to steer until they're well past the battlefield. He knows what they're trying to keep him from seeing, and he doesn't like what seeing ~~all the people he killed~~ that does to him, so he hasn't looked. When he does finally look, he sees blessedly empty ocean.

“So... how long do we have to get to Ba Sing Se?” he asks.

“Uncle should be there in about a month,” Katara says. Into the ensuing silence about thirty seconds later, she adds “what?”

“You called him Uncle,” Zuko says.

“We all call him that,” Katara says.

Aang grins. “Yeah, but you didn't until just now.”

Katara sighs. “He's pretty cool, okay? And I guess he's... Uncle.”

Momo chatters happily. “Momo's right. It'll only take us a couple of weeks to get there. We should look around and see if we can find me an earthbending teacher before we get there.”

“Right,” Sokka says. “But see, we should still stick to the schedule. I've got it all worked out.”

Zuko groans at a shuffling of paper, and Aang turns to see Sokka opening up a chart. There are multiple colors of writing on it. “I'm engaged to a guy who makes charts for trips,” Zuko says.

“I am so glad I missed the naked engagement party,” Katara teases.

"I dunno, Yue seemed to like it," Sokka says.

"Yue isn't your sister, Babe," Zuko points out.

"She better not be," Sokka says. "That'd make last night really awkward."

"I do not need to hear about you three jerkbending," Katara complains. Aang giggles, because that's... pretty funny.

“Okay, so according to your schedule, when do we arrive in Ba Sing Se,” Zuko prompts.

Sokka smiles, and inspects the chart, and then he shrugs. “Ah, about a month. The schedule can wait. It hasn't been calm in days. I say we play a travel game. Who's up for I spy? Um... I spy... something blue."

"The ocean," Katara says.

Sokka sighs. "Fine. Okay."

"Next one's Appa," Zuko says.

"Then the sky," Aang says.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So that's the end of part 1! I'm running D&D tomorrow and doing prep work tonight, so expect the first chapter of part 2 in two days.


End file.
